


The Bunker

by Regency



Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alien!Jack, Alternate Reality, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ancients, Betrayal, Charlie Lives!, Charlie doesn't, Child Death, Episode: s04e16 2010, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Gen, Jack-Centric, Jealousy, Know what you're getting yourself into, Lost Love, Navel-Gazing, Sam is Special Ops Barbie at least once, Sam-Centric, Team Dynamics, Team as Family, This is a lot of summarization, Time Travel, Wear your hard hats, and some dialogue exchanges, implied infidelity, old fic, the last one standing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-24
Updated: 2014-05-24
Packaged: 2018-01-26 09:04:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 18
Words: 36,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1682684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Regency/pseuds/Regency
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of interesting but unfinished Stargate fanfiction by me.</p><p>See the chapter index for more information.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. SG-1: Bonds I (a Janet Lives AU)

**Author's Note:**

> Heads up on how I write: Ellipses (...) mean that more is supposed to go there but I didn't get around to writing it. Text in brackets ([...]) are placeholders or summaries for scenes I haven't written. Dual line breaks (~!~ ~!~) mean that additional scenes are supposed to go between the scene before and after the breaks.
> 
> Each story has a brief AU note in the title if that helps.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five years after Jack’s disappearance during the shakedown cruise of the Icarus, the general returns with bad news—and some good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rated PG, implied character death, around 5500 words total

**I**

                Sam was never going to assent to the ironic naming of a ship again.  Not as long as there were eagles on her shoulders, not even when there were stars.  As long as she was alive, Sam was absolutely going to refuse to sign-off on the idiotically optimistic naming of anymore ships.

                The _Odyssey_ had been enough—more than enough, actually—and had lived up to its name.  The _Hammond_ had been an honor and she wished he’d been there for it.  The _Icarus_ had been tempting fate and she’d known it from the moment the schematics had come down.  It was nearly a total work of backwards-engineered Asgard technology and she’d never been able to say with any certainty if the Brass had really understood how it all worked.  Sam knew she hadn’t and it had been her job to put it all together.

                And put it together she had, in the quiet moments of life on Atlantis and in between skirmishes in the Pegasus Galaxy.  She had pieced together what would work where and she had figured out a fair way to duplicate it all on an entirely new platform.  She had built the first _Cassandra_ -Class battleship of the twenty-first century, and Jack O’Neill had been there every step of the way.

                Standing on the bridge of the _Icarus_ just before it got under way, Sam had wished that she was going along for the ride.  Her former CO, the Major General himself, was already decked out in his flight suit with his earpiece in place when he pulled her in for a tight hug goodbye.  For a man who’d sworn that he was just a jet jockey from antiquity, he’d filled the command chair with ease, leaving Sam to regret once more that she hadn’t been tapped to be his XO.  The trip had had all the makings of the adventure of a lifetime. Given their lifetime, that was saying something.

                Five years later, she could still call the memory of that hug to mind with ease—and did often during harsher times.  When she could hardly stand to put one more foot in front of the other, when she could barely bring herself to her feet after a particularly nasty hit, she remembered the encompassing warmth of his arms around her and how infinitely possible the impossible had suddenly seemed.  He’d always underestimated the strength of his embrace; for Daniel, for a terrified child, for her.  As far as he’d ever been concerned, he was just holding them together until they gathered their own strength and carried on.  He’d always been wrong about that.  She still liked to think that someday she’d get to tell him so.

                Even if someday was seeming more and more like never all the time.

                Even if a tiny part of her had already whispered that truth to stars in the hopes that somewhere out there it’d find him.

                Just like the Icarus of Greek mythology flew too close to the sun, Jack had flown too close to the stars and the ending was the same—their wings had fallen apart and, now, neither could fly.

                Just like Icarus, Jack had never come home.

~!~

                Sam doubted she’d ever remember what she’d been doing the day the call had come in.  It had been a weekday, so chances were good that she’d spent it slaving away in her lab, working through one mineral survey or another.  Chances were good, too, she hadn’t left for hours save for the call she’d taken from Cassie and a cup of Jell-O she’d picked up during a bathroom break.

                It was odd how much her life hadn’t changed once it had rearranged itself around the loss of the _Icarus_ five years ago.  At least, she thought so.  Those first few days and weeks had been spent with frantic searching by Earth and its allies for the lost ship.  The Ori were gone, the Goa’uld mostly defeated, and the Replicators a faint, if itchy, memory.  There was no one that they’d been able to think of at the time that would benefit from the acquisition of a ship outfitted with Asgard technology. And, trust her, she’d thought hard.

                Between herself, Teal’c, Daniel, Vala, Cam, and General Landry, they’d done all they could to come up with a list of suspects, but the truth was that by the time _Icarus_ had headed into the great space beyond, there just weren’t many adversaries that SG-1 and company hadn’t conquered.  They were at a loss and remained at one. Four years, forty-three weeks, and two days after the mass memorial service that was held for the crew, the unease they all felt at the unsolved mystery hadn’t gone away.  Neither had their unresolved feelings toward the loss of their old friend and comrade.

                Sam tried not to think about the general, but he was, well, the general and he was always on her mind in one capacity or another.  She could hardly believe that someday not too far in the future, he would have been out of her life as long as he’d been part of it.  It didn’t seem to make sense that he could change her so fundamentally but be only a tourist passing through.

                _Yeah, Jack O’Neill, the consummate tourist. Makes perfect sense._   She would have laughed at the absurdity if she wasn’t afraid it would start a trend.  Her inner monologue sounded too much like him on the best of the days. The last thing she wanted to do was be caught responding to the remnants of him, the faint echoes that remained of what they used to share. _Whatever that was._

                On any given day, she would find herself having this argument with herself.  She really didn’t know what they’d had anymore.  Distance hadn’t given her perspective, but smudged the details.  She was the only one alive or accessible who knew what they’d had and she could in no way say she’d ever understood it.  She’d finally decided that she never would; didn’t mean she’d stop wondering.

                The moment her name had been blasted over the PA, Sam had been out of her seat.  She’d given up on expecting it to be news from deep space.  She would have lost her mind long ago if she’d kept at that.  A tiny part of her, though, the part that was still Captain Samantha Carter reporting for duty, still thought maybe…

                She reached the Control Room with her usual amount of urgency and was behind the gate computer before she’d even registered that her presence wasn’t a matter of gate mechanics.

                “Colonel, ma’am, it’s a call from NORAD,” said now-Captain Graham Simmons from the phone at the wall.  Sam flushed, but nodded, and rose to switch places with him.

                “This is Colonel Carter.”  Sam instinctively leaned against the wall to give herself the illusion of privacy.  It was an old habit that allowed her to keep pretty much everyone in sight.  One more instinct honed at the behest of her former CO.

                “Colonel, this is Major Gaines up at NORAD. I think you should put an eye on the sky, or should I say orbit.”

                Sam furrowed her brow in confusion and turned to see Simmons was already on it.  “What are you talking about, Major? What’s going on up there?”

                “We’ve got visitors, ma’am.  Maybe even old friends.”  While he didn’t hang up immediately, Sam was pretty sure she never spoke to him again that day.  She had other things on her mind. For one, the fleet of ships currently sweeping toward the planet Earth with all the regal ferocity of nest of falcons.

                “Holy shit.”  Any other time, Sam would have reprimanded her subordinate for that kind of language, but not today.  In the middle of the surging wave was a craft as familiar as her old Indian, as her Volvo, as any naquadah generator that had ever touched her hands.

                “It’s _Icarus._ ”  She’d eventually feel like an idiot for stating the obvious. She just couldn’t muster that kind of pride at the moment.  This just didn’t feel real.

                Sam shook herself free of her shock. She needed to make contact before Homeworld got involved.  No, she needed to be hip-deep in this when Homeworld got involved.  _Damn Landry for taking personal time and leaving me in charge today._

                “Captain, hail the _Hammond_. I want to be beamed up in ten minutes, twenty tops. I don’t give a damn if I’m in the head when they do it. It’s on my order.”  She started out the control room with every intention of returning to her lab to close up shop.

                “Ma’am, yes, ma’am.”  At the determination in his voice, Sam paused and reconsidered.

                “It’s a figure of speech, Graham. If I’m in the head, I’d really rather not be beamed out just yet.”  She knew for a fact that he was smiling when she left.

                “Yes, ma’am.”

                Just because her head was in the stars, didn’t mean she didn’t have some idea what this could mean for her people.  They could be getting their drive back. They could be getting their purpose.  In the years following the _Icarus_ fiasco, the program had largely languished between a congress that was too uneasy to fund them properly and a dry spell of technological and cultural discovery.   All they had was what they could build and without the right tools, they couldn’t build much.

                Not for the first time, Sam envied Daniel’s decision to head out to the Pegasus galaxy.  They likely saw more action on a regular basis than anyone Earth-side.  The program hadn’t flourished the way it deserved to. These people were the best of the best, but for the first time, the SGC wasn’t such a sweet gig anymore.  Sam hated that it had come to that.

                She was in her lab before she even thought of the walk there.  She kept a go-bag packed in case she ever had to leave unexpectedly for places unknown. She hadn’t used it since her impromptu trip to see Cassie at med school months back and had used it even more rarely in the years before.  With her family, besides Mark, dead, missing, or spread to the edges of the universe as she knew it, Sam wasn’t taking a lot of pleasure trips these days.

                Taking a deep breath to assuage the odd feeling of expectancy in her gut, Sam picked up the bag and shut down everything that might blow her lab to pieces in her absence.  If she noticed that there were far more things that could do that than there would have been when SG-1 was active, Sam didn’t let it bother her.  She didn’t let much bother her.  This was reality; fortunately, it was beginning to look up.

                Sam had just shut down her laptop and locked up her lab when she felt the tell-tale tingle that came with being de-molecularized encompass her from head to toe.  When it passed, Sam found herself on the command deck of the _Hammond_ where Colonel Paul Davis had come to welcome her.  She shook his hand with a smile.

                The way he was dressed combined with usual air of competency that surrounded him gave Paul the appearance of someone who’d always known command and hadn’t spent his formative experience hand-holding for generals with too much free time.  She’d always been impressed by that.

                “Welcome back to the _Hammond_ , Colonel.  I delayed hailing the lead vessel until you arrived. Thought you’d like to be onboard for that.”

                “You thought right,” Sam quipped, glad that having a friend in the right place at the right time was panning out.

                Paul smiled with a nod to one of his junior officers. “Lieutenant Castile will take your go-bag if you’d like to stay on deck.”

                “That’d be great,” she said, handing it over without a moment’s hesitation.  The _Hammond’s_ crew was a good sort.  She’d helped a number of them through their initial proving ground as entrants to the SGC.  _A better band of geeks could not be found_. Or so she thought the general would have said.  She tried not to think about that since it could still be wishful thinking. She was mostly successful.

                She took a place standing slightly behind him so as not to cause any confusion.  He was in command, she was simply a guest onboard his ship.  Because she’d served as commander here for a brief tour, she struggled to remember that.  Her fingers digging distractedly into the back of the command seat, Sam set him on with a nod. He returned it and passed it on to a subordinate at the communications terminal.

                “All frequencies open, sir.  You can begin when you’re ready.”

                “Thank you, Captain.”  Paul stood up straight and took a deep, steadying breath.  Sam took another one for him.  She thought she might have been more afraid than he was.  “This is the Earth ship, _Hammond._   I am Colonel Paul Davis, commander of this vessel.  Please identify yourself.”

                There was a moment of oppressive silence that made Sam want to fidget with an intensity that would have galled the Colonel O’Neill of old.  She had really come to hate expectant silences.

                “I repeat--”

                “We hear you, Colonel,” came a sharp, clear voice that Sam hadn’t heard in _over_ five years.  For a moment, Sam was sure that her delusions had stepped out of her head and found a comm set.  The sudden widening of Paul’s eyes told her that she definitely hadn’t imagined that, or she hadn’t been the only one.

                “With whom am I speaking,” he carried on with a cautious air.  If it had only been the two of them, Sam was convinced he’d have been crouched low and waiting for a threat to present itself wrapped in a bow.  It would have been perfectly understandable as far as she was concerned.  She might have even joined him.

                “Come now, Colonel. You know you recognize my voice. If you say you don’t, I’ll be offended.”

                Paul swallowed and Sam felt a little dizzy.  This might be the best day of her life. Well, maybe not the best, but she’d been right about things looking up.

                “Doctor Frasier?”

                “The one and only.”

                “At least until Cassie finishes med school,” Sam piped up, because she needed some sign that this was her best friend, that this was really Janet.

                There was a beat and Sam began to wonder if all this suspense had been a ruse and all for nothing.

                “Just tell me she isn’t going to be a podiatrist and I can die happy.”

                Sam exhaled, giving Paul a reassuring nod. They’d have to do tests on top of tests to confirm, but by voice, this was her.  “No, she decided that there was no greater honor than following in her mother’s footsteps.” Another beat and Sam felt like a partner in a dance.  They were pulling and turning each other, testing each other for accuracy and know-how.

                “I’ll never know where she gets that sentimentality from,” the woman Sam wanted to know as Janet laughed with a side of tears.  Sam was laughing along with her. She felt utterly out of control and she just wanted to hug her friend after so long missing her.

                “Doctor Frasier,” Paul cut in suddenly and Sam was reminded sharply that this wasn’t her first contact, wasn’t her bridge.  She couldn’t bear to be sheepish when she was this happy, so she shrugged. He gave an understanding look and moved on.  “Doctor Frasier, I need to know how you came to be aboard the _Icarus_ when you, for all intents and purpose, _died_ prior to its even being commissioned.”

                The beat this time was longer, far longer and Sam’s sinking feeling returned.

                “Janet?”  Sam’s fingernails felt like they would split and break from the force she was exerting on the chair cushion.  “Janet, you need to answer him.”

                “All right,” came the grudging answer, and Sam should know. She’d spent years listening to the former CMO grudgingly allow members of SG-1 to go home before she thought they were ready because she knew that the healing they needed could be best accomplished surrounded by family.  This was that person or a damned good facsimile.  Sam wasn’t in the mood to parse what that could truly mean.

                “Doctor Frasier, is the crew with you? Are they intact?”  That he meant the general went without saying, but Sam really wished it hadn’t.  There was an audible sigh along the frequency so like Cassie in a snit that Sam had to wonder who exactly had inherited it from whom. 

                “For the most part, Colonel, the crew of the _Icarus_ remains intact.  Unfortunately, there have been deaths and catastrophic injuries in the years since they departed from Earth and those have diminished their numbers somewhat. But, yes, the crew is generally intact.”

                _Speaking of generals,_ Sam thought.

                “Does that include Major General O’Neill, Doctor?”  Sam was an inch from requisitioning a vintage SG-1 patch for Davis on the grounds that he could read her mind as well her teammates had ever been able to.

                “He’s fine, Sam.” Never mind that Sam hadn’t been the one doing the asking, she sagged in relief just the same. “Fine and good, fine and well. He’s fine. A little homesick and glad to see this old ball of blue and green again, but healthy.”

                “That’s great, Janet. Just great.”  Instead of being elated, Sam was drained. Years of wondering was down to knowing he’d survived and somehow Janet had risen from the dead.  Neither of these things had been impossibilities, but they’d been too much to hope for.

                “Where is the general, Doctor?”

                “Manning the bridge aboard _Icarus_.”

                “I thought we were speaking to the _Icarus_ ,” Paul explained for both their sakes.

                “No, you’re speaking to the…” She sighed. “You’re speaking to the Lingard vessel, _Doc._ ”

                “Lingard,” Sam questioned as Paul murmured, “Doc?”  It was a funny momentary exchange of roles.

                “Yes and _yes._   It’s a long story, Paul and even longer story, Sam.”

                Paul seemed to gather his composure and stow away his confusion.  “We’ll have to hear it sometime soon, Doctor.  In the meantime, perhaps it’s time you made the formal re-introductions.”

                “…Very well, Colonel.  Axwin, open a channel to _Icarus._ ” A faint mechanic beeping was the only alert Sam and Paul received. “Commander, it’s the _Hammond_. Looks like they’d like to say hello.”

                Sam held her breath even if she didn’t know why.  _Either a great dream or I’m starting to_ love _my hallucinations._

                “Well, howdy, campers,” said that all too familiar voice.

                Paul took an instinctive step forward. “Sir? General, if that’s really you, sir, can you give a sign of some sort?”

                “I don’t…think so.  I don’t have my ID on me, Davis, but as soon as I dig it out of my empty coffin at Arlington, I’ll get back to you.”  Sam winced and smiled at the same time, a common response to Jack O’Neill’s unique brand of humor.

                “If it isn’t him, someone is making amazing reproductions,” Paul muttered in her direction, to which she could only nod agreeably.  She didn’t want him or either of them to be clones.  She wanted this to be the biggest coup of her life.

                “Hey, Carter, you there?” he asked out of the blue.  Sam felt that Paul’s same compulsion to step forward to be acknowledged even if she couldn’t be seen.  So far, communication was audio-only.

                “Yes, sir.”

                “You got any stars yet?”

                Sam raised an eyebrow at Paul, who shrugged.  “Unless you mean the ones from the view outside, sir, no.”

                “Then, damn it, somebody isn’t doing their job right. You should have been a general a decade ago.”

                Sam rolled her eyes with more than a touch of fondness. “Sir, you only left five years ago.” She’d been a major ten years ago. Going this far this quickly was already a remarkable achievement.

                “I didn’t say I did the job any better, but at least I was working on it.”

                “Yes, sir.”  Absurdity was the order of the day and Sam was happy enough to go along for the ride.

                “You humoring me, Colonel?”

                “Yeahsureyabetcha, sir.”

                “It’s good talking to you again, Carter.”  She couldn’t refute the sincerity in his voice any more than she could refute the earnestness in her own.

                “Likewise, sir.  Welcome home.”  She noted Paul sending her a prodding glance and nodded to show she understood. “Sir, it’d probably go a long way to getting us all together if you could tell us who your friends are.”

                “Ah, wondered when we’d get to that.”

                “Sooner is better,” Paul intoned, ever the voice of business and reason.

                “But later is greater,” the general countered, leaving Sam far more amused than the remark merited.  _This is probably withdrawal._ She hadn’t done much giggling recently. She supposed she was just making up for lost time.

                “General,” Paul started and if Sam didn’t know better she’d say he was about to reprimand a former superior officer.

                “Colonel,” SG-1’s former commander returned in the same tone.  This had all the makings of a Mexican standoff, which Sam really didn’t think was necessary.

                “Uh, guys, we should probably get this over with before someone launches fighters and this has a chance to get out of hand.”

                The general let out a sigh that would have tripped Sam’s meter on a bad day off-world. She didn’t want to see what it could do now.  “We wouldn’t retaliate. We’re here to make friends, Carter. Is that gonna be a problem?”

                “No, sir, but the IOA is going to want more than just ‘We come in peace’ as a statement of intent.”

                “You’ve been around me _way_ too long,” he replied with gleeful pride.

                “Not in a long time, sir. I think your influence is starting to wear off.”

                “Well, we can’t have that.”

                “No, sir.”  If Sam didn’t know better, she’d say she just started bouncing on the balls on her feet in tribute to him. But she did know better and she wasn’t that far gone yet.

                “All right, then.”

Further mechanical chirping filled the air and filled Sam with curiosity about how exactly the ships’ hardware worked in the Lingard fleet.  She was hoping she’d get a chance to take a look. Wonderful reunions or not, Sam was a tinkerer at heart and she wanted to tinker with those ships a little. Okay, a lot. Maybe they’d let her take one home?

                “Hey, Davis. You ready?”

                “Yes, sir,” the ship’s commander replied, standing up straight and tall as though at attention.

                “Here goes:  I, Major General Jack O’Neill, Supreme Commander of the Lingard Fleet, have returned to the Milky Way Galaxy in the hopes of brokering an alliance between the Lingard and the people of the planet Earth.”  Sam turned stunned eyes to Paul and got a stunned look in return.  _We’re really going to have to expand our facial repertoire now that he’s back in town._ “That good enough?”

                “I think that’ll be acceptable, sir.”

                “Good. Don’t forget to tell the blowhards, er…Brass that I said hello.  I’d hate for them to think I didn’t miss them.”

                “Of course, sir.”  There was a moment of a silence where Sam could almost see the general thinking feverishly.

  “You could probably use some time to think about this.”

                “Wouldn’t hurt, sir.”  Paul had dropped into his seat like he’d taken custody of a boulder.

                “By all means, think carefully. I’ll be having dinner with ole Doc Frasier. You know, traveling across a couple of galaxies is way more work than the Asgard ever made it seem like.”

                “I bet, sir,” Sam responded absently.

                “I could sleep for days.”

                “You have slept for days,” Janet said suddenly, reminding them all that she was present and had been listening for the duration.

                “Just for that, no Jell-O for you, Doc.”

                “I’m watching my figure, sir. I wasn’t going to have any anyway.”

                “So you say, madam. So you say.”

                Janet could all but be heard rolling her eyes and Sam wished she was there, seeing what they were seeing and knowing what they knew.  _Looks like it was the adventure of a lifetime after all._

“Hey, Carter, we’ll save you some Jell-O!”

                Sam found herself smiling and shaking her head. She wished the rest of SG-1 could be here right now. “Thank you, sir. I’m sure it’ll be great.”  Paul rose to go compose a message to the leadership on Earth, but he was smiling dazedly all the way.  Sam gave his should a comforting clap as he passed by.

                “Is she humoring me, Janet?”

                “Yup.”

                “You wound me, Doc.”

                “That’s what my needles are for, sir.”

                “Carter, you have to protect me from this pocket-sized tyrant.”

                There was a quasi-ominous silence and Sam lifted an eyebrow to no one in particular.

                “We’re not even on the same ship and I can feel you glaring at me. Turn it down a notch.”

                “I could say the same for you, sir.  If you don’t watch it, I’ll make you babysit.”

                “That’s not so bad, I love the muppet.”  Sam narrowed her eyes in some confusion.  _Is it possible they’ve gone completely crazy?_ It had been a few years, she reasoned.

                “‘Moppet,’ sir?” Janet vacillated between formality and familiarity as though the dance she’d done with Sam continued without her, too.  Now, the general was her partner.

                “Honestly, Janet, she’s about the size of a muppet, so I think I’ll stick with my word.”

                “You’re not calling my daughter a muppet, Jack.  She’ll get a complex.”

                “…A Napoleonic complex?”

                The silence wasn’t quasi-anything this time.

                “Stop it! You’re really starting to freak me out with that.”

                “I came back from the dead five years ago, just ‘cause, and _now_ you’re getting freaked out. Really?”

                Sam decided that she needed to hear this entire story as soon as humanly possible, because it sounded like a doozy.  “Sir, Janet, Colonel Davis is going to get in touch with the President right now, but we’ll hail you again when we have news.”

                There was a loaded silence and Sam wondered, not idly in the least, whether they were communicating with each other by less obvious means.

                She wasn’t reassured when they answered simultaneously, “Sounds great,” and “Yeah, sure, Carter.”

                “ _Icarus_ out,” the general said first.

                “ _Doc_ out,” Janet followed.

                Sam sat down in Paul’s abandoned con seat and wondered, _What the hell is going on here?_


	2. Bonds II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Asgard had asked Jack to do a big job and he needed a big friend to help. Well, big in presence, if not in frame.

**I**

                Jack sat cross-legged on the floor of the medical bay aboard the Asgard ship _Samantha Carter II_ , as he had for several hours now. Most of that time had been spent considering the merits of vigorously banging his head against the nearest healing pod, because there were some moments of human naïveté that shook even him.   The rest of the time had been wiled away attempting, in vain, to stare through the fogged glass covering of the pod.  All he could make out from his vantage point was a human-sized head and what he imagined was auburn hair.  If he was honest, he’d been filling in the blanks ever since.

                It had never occurred to them to ask. Hell, he’d never actually thought it was possible. As far as they’d known, the Asgard were several trillion light years from their location the day Janet Frasier had shuffled from this mortal coil.  There’d been no reason to ask for a helping hand in the aftermath (because death was irreparable), thus, their ally had seen no cause to offer one.  Now, there was cause.

                Now, Jack had cause—and he had a mission to pursue.

                His mission was to save the Asgard of the Galaxy of Lae from the same genetic deterioration that had been a catalyst to the end of the Idan Asgard.  How? Through an Ancient device that was hidden on a planet far beyond the Milky Way, also far beyond Ida.  The Stargate network cut-off long before it reached that far, leaving was only space to guide them. Space and science, two things of which he had a healthy fear and for which he had limited patience.

                He’d been concerned from the beginning that his total lack of scientific know-how would leave him wanting when it came to synthesizing some kind of solution to the disorder that had overtaken his little grey friends, but they hadn’t wondered.  What had remained of them anyway.  The consciousnesses of many of the Ida/Milky Way Asgard had been absorbed by the Asgard of Lae, also known as the Lingard.  They worked, they struggled, they adapted, but they would die again if Jack couldn’t save them.  This splinter group was not so similar in physiology and Jack worried, as did those recently resurrected, that there was a chance that the Lingard forms would reject the expansive intellects of the Idan Asgard.

                Their worries had not been in vain.  The first died the day after Jack had offhandedly commented about how useful Janet would have been on a mission like this.  That unlucky fellow had been placed in stasis indefinitely in the hope that, when Jack completed his mission, he could be revived.  It was his decline that had added a sense of urgency to their mission.  Jack’s absentminded remark had become a serious consideration, unbeknownst to the man himself, and before he’d had a chance to think up anything else harebrained but just dumb enough to work, Thor had come to him with a proposition.

                They’d bring Janet back if she was the best person to help him get the job done. Not _Icarus’_ CMO, not one of the corpsmen onboard, Janet. If he wanted her, she could be resurrected.  Who was he to say no?

                A couple of days passed had found him sitting right on that floor and watching for hours at a stretch.  Transferring a consciousness was easy, but building a body and aging it was harder.  The first go at recreating Janet Frasier had already failed and the newborn’s cries still echoed in his head.  She had been an error, they’d said; a miscalculation in programming.  It was only the obvious blundering of their own genetic engineering that kept him from lashing out at their detachment.

                He’d told them, particularly Thor, that Little Doc was no mistake and that if they so much as hinted at disposing of her, any deal they might have had was off.  They’d listened and the crew complement of the _Icarus_ had found itself immediately increased by one.

                Jack didn’t know what the hell he was thinking taking on an infant in the middle of a mission to a faraway galaxy.  He knew it was damned nuts but everything in his honor had screamed that he had a duty to protect the kid from the moment she’d been born, regardless of whether today she’d become the woman so many had missed for so long.  She’d grow up to be Janet Frasier someday and he’d failed to bring that woman home once before, he couldn’t see leaving her to her fate again.

                And that was that and this was this.  The genetics team had called upon some long-preserved DNA samples of the Doc’s and started to make another perfect copy.  Perfect down to the day she’d died.  It had taken hours to begin and hours more to complete.  It felt like the longest day and Jack was glad to know that he had Ferretti to take the deck while he was gone.  His crew was plenty scared enough without there being a sudden vacuum of leadership to account for.  As it was, he and his old friend Lou were going to have a hell of a conversation about all things Asgard, Lingard, and Ancient. Serious intergalactic space travel would probably come up, too, but Jack already had that planned out.  Mostly.


	3. Bonds III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam has back two of the people she never wanted to lose, so does Earth. Now what?
> 
> Nobody knows, not even me.

**II**

                As much as Sam would have liked to stick around and wait for the IOA and Homeworld to respond to the General’s offer, she still technically had a base to run.  She’d been essentially AWOL for an hour but, given that there wasn’t anything immediately pressing to deal with, she figured she should head on back to the SGC. To be safe, she was leaving her go-bag on _Hammond_ in case something did come up that required a long, protracted, preferably exciting romp through space.

                Not that she was secretly wishing for that to happen or anything.

                With a nod and a prayer, she beamed back into the briefing room on Level 28 and headed into Landry’s office to take care of whatever paperwork had exponentially reproduced in her absence.  She had no doubt there was a bunny farm worth of requisition forms tipping drunkenly out of the inbox just waiting to fall on the floor at the least provocation.


	4. Atlantis: Bone China (a metal Elizabeth AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stargate Atlantis: 100 (okay, 25) years with what's left of Elizabeth Weir, Replicator Elizabeth Weir
> 
> Spoilers: First Strike, Lifeline, Adrift, Be All My Sins Remember’d, Ghost in the Machine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rated G, 1700 words, gen

**One Earth Year After Falling**

                _Building perfect machines means they never die when they’re supposed to._   Elizabeth was sure of it, or as sure as she was anything on this world from hell.  Here, she was hunted by brothers and her sisters, a victim of the scent that defined her inhumanity and made her easy prey.

                They hated her.

                She’d doomed them to an interminable existence in the vacuum of space; she could understand their anger more than a little.

                The bark of the tall tree she called her temporary home bit into her indestructible skin. Her skin bit back, nanites transforming this gift of nature into a material of subservience for her comfort.  _Soft._   The programming had never taken; she could replicate, she could heal.  It wasn’t something she had to think about now.  The parasites that composed her continued to rule her world.  She’d long since conceded defeat against them.

                At that, she could have laughed. Conceding defeat was all she did anymore, had been since they’d floated into this planet’s orbit and come crashing down to ground.  The re-awakening had been far from joyous. 

Elizabeth was certain she’d left more of herself at the crash site than she’d escaped with.  Her body may have been self-repairing, but something within her yearned for the bits of herself she kept leaving behind, the same something that yearned for her old face and hair and bones.  Had she still believed herself capable of possessing one, she might have called it her soul.  But she didn’t believe she had one, not anymore.

The formerly organic material of the tree that curled around her had taken on the signature appearance of replicator blocks.  What had been unyielding bark had melted into an alcove, one that would safeguard her for the night.  She didn’t have to rest or sleep, but sometimes she liked to dream.  It was the only human habit she had left, the only thing that reminded her that Elizabeth Weir had been real once and had lived an incredible life.

And if she had her way, someday she’d have it all again.

~!~

**Five Years**

Elizabeth, or Elizavet as she was better known here, stepped out of the Parthenon and into the sun.  She was exhilarated, vindicated; she didn’t feel so much the weight of the world on her shoulders, not the way she usually did. Her speech had been well-received by the members of the Senate, even those who often declared their antipathy toward her.  There would be a school for girls soon and, she hoped, for servants.

“We are only as commendable as our least common denominator.  How dare we conquer others when we have yet to conquer our own ignorance,” she’d told a room filled with powerful aristocrats. 

She’d nearly stumbled on her soapbox.  This planet, this venue was a dream come true.  It was Ancient Greece, alive and thriving in a galaxy so distant from the one where she’d been born, it was almost impossible to believe.

 _Daniel Jackson would be gob smacked_ , she could see it as certainly as she could recall his face; and she could recall it perfectly.  She wondered how well the years had treated him, how many more times he’d died since she’d gone the first time.  He kept finding his way back to the land of the living while she stood drowning in immortal stuff, exiled from that very place.  However hard she tried, it never felt less than absolutely unfair.

 _Some of us are lucky_ , she consoled herself, _and some of us are not._   The optimist she was born as had perished with her blood.  She was embarrassed to admit she’d learned that, somehow, Replicators could cry.  Perhaps it was another of those ‘mind over matter’ achievements she’d excelled at in the last five years.  She truly couldn’t say.  These pests that had become her closest companions were as much a mystery to her today as they had been when they invaded.  At times, they kowtowed to her will and adhered to her every whim.  On other days, they conceded nothing and cost her everything.

She hadn’t stopped running for existence since she woke up.  First, she’d been forced to outrun her enraged brethren in a race that would have led to her obliteration.  How they would have managed it, she didn’t know; yet, she didn’t doubt the tenacity of four furious Replicators with an eternity to make themselves felt.  Elizabeth had been tortured to death countless times while in Oberoth’s possession; if all that remained was her dignity, she would not go through that again.

Thus, she’d run.  She ran up the coast of the first continent and, when they found her, she ran back.  With a mechanical heart of desperation, she fled through the soul of that wild place and made a home among the trees. In her former life, she’d never been an outdoorsman, more familiar with the intricacies of room service than survival tactics, but she’d been forced to improvise.  Quiet had become the watchword of her days and the necessity of nights.

More than once, she’d almost given in. The loneliness was almost as corruptive as any hunger.  The birds and insects and predators were enough to fill the silence, but they didn’t speak.  What they did was keep secrets and Elizabeth had enough to write a few dozen fables, so she told.  They sensed she was no threat and seemed to listen and that was enough to make her stronger until she could leave.  And leave she did on the day when the ships came.

She left her brethren behind on that world with nothing for a future with everything. But she’d wondered as she flew away, with her new friends and their grand new toys, if the woman she used to be would have done this – and she knew.  She left her human heart on that planet, too.

It was these people she’d found. These aberrations of time and, most surprisingly, space. They spoke as the Greek did and dealt as the Greeks dealt, but they roamed the stars when not buried in the matters of the day.  They were not perfect and not always just, but so long as the foreign woman, Elizavet of the outland, was here, she would try to do something to change that.  How else to spend an eternity alive?

~!~

**Fifteen Years**

                 In thirteen years, Elizabeth Weir had overcome the useless limitations of Fran’s form and made it her own.  In thirteen years and two months, its face was her face; its eyes her own, its cheeks her cheeks, and its smile her smile.  Somewhere around the fourteen-year mark, she caught sight of her eyebrow quirking in the reflection of a nearby stream.  She hadn’t even felt it twitch.

                Slowly, the nanites that had taken everything began to give it back.  They began to revert her to her natural form, if it could be called that still.  It was in year fifteen, spent on a new planet far from the demons of the first one that she noted the way the humidity made her hair curl madly around her face.  Fran’s hair had never done that.  Being a vague facsimile of what Rodney would have considered a less than ideal woman, her hair had been nearly straw straight and utterly manageable, utterly boring.  It hadn’t been Elizabeth at all.  Never before had she been so happy to battle bed head for dominance.

                Standing in her quarters, facing herself in the shining surface of a polished shield, Elizabeth felt a subtle peace steal over her.  This wasn’t where she belonged; not among this people of rough-hewn swords and tree-dwelling, these huntresses and gatherers, but it was nice to know that she could be here a while and be safe.  It was nice to know that when one of them had offered her their hand in friendship, they’d done it having seen her true face.

                With a smile she couldn’t stifle, she twined her braided hair around the bone of a conquered bird and secured it at the nape of her neck.  This woman she had become was a character, a scholar in warrior’s armor.  Her dagger was bone, too; her shield was what remained of some unlucky ship on a stormy night. 

They might have been a relatively primitive people, but they were skilled.  The ship had been aground a day before it was targeted for acquisition; it lasted a sum of four days after that.  She was reluctantly impressed to realize what damage good rocks could do in determined hands.  She was reluctantly proud to admit she’d helped.  If Elizabeth’s guess was right, the passengers had died on impact. More than ever in the past, she wanted to be right.

Nevertheless, their sacrifice had lived on in her adopted people.  They integrated the alien material into their clothes and their homes.  They’d discovered mirrors and metallic cookware and reinforced siding.  They stood stronger than they ever had, because a group of strangers had died.

Despite her attempts to ignore the symbolism, she couldn’t smother the hope that losing her had made Atlantis stronger, too.  But she tried not to think of it too much.

After all, she’d never know.

~!~

**Twenty-Five Years**

                She curled up on the dock that overlooked the ocean.  It was a beautiful sight, this sight, but it was not her ocean and these were neither her stars nor her sky.  That was something she missed more than anything, the orientation of the moons above and the direction from which the sun rose.  It wasn’t the same here in this hallowed but empty place. Atlantis had returned without her heart and was left with only her bones.

                Elizabeth knew that feeling, almost. The difference was that her bones had been replaced, too.

~!~

**Fifty Years**

~!~

**Sixty-Five Years**

~!~

**Eighty-Five Years**

~!~

**One Hundred Years**

 

 


	5. SG-1: Child Soldier (a clone!Jack AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Talk about your misnomers. Jack’s clone has found himself caught in a nasty little scenario with the international military-industrial complex, but he’s in a mood to turn that around and his old self is in a position to help.
> 
> Spoilers for Fragile Balance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rated, PG-13, gen, approx 1225 words, descriptions of child/young adult death & abduction

**Chapter I: Hell Beach**

                _Pretend you don’t hear the dogs_ , Jack coached himself while reaching for the next gap in the high brick wall.  He forced his body up with his unwounded leg and paid no mind to the one that dangled on the last foothold, dripping blood to the torture-crazed canines snapping at his heels.  They’d be gone as soon as he was at the top and over. They wouldn’t be on the other side; all he had to do was reach the top.  _Just one more obstacle_ , he assured his weary body, _just one more._

He tossed his right arm across the hedge that the lined the head of the wall and into the branches to anchor his ascent.  The thick limbs creaked and warped under his weight but didn’t give.  He didn’t realize he’d started holding his breath until he was draped, panting, over the green.  The blood still drip-dropped toward the muddy bottom and the hounds still waited.  They wanted him to fall so that he could be their meal.

                Jack had an idea how hungry they must have been, had a feeling that it was the burning emptiness in their stomachs that fueled the rage that made them snap and gnaw and chase at bodies too untrained to handle the strain.  The course behind him was littered with the desecrated corpses of the kids who’d been too slow.

 He hadn’t been all that fast himself, just fast enough to outrun them.  He’d tried to pull some to speed with him, but they’d been too spooked to hear his instructions and follow his lead.  It was every guy and girl for themselves when the dogs barked.  They’d been let out of their pig pen of a shipping container only to land on Hell Beach.

It was giving Ne’tu a run for its money and he’d only been here for hours, maybe a quarter of a day.  They sunset they’d arrived under had passed into eerie night.  There used to be screaming as far the ears could perceive and the sound of grass and cracked leaves crunches under a multitude of feet.  But from up here, way up here, Jack could only hear himself breathing. Breathing, bleeding, and dying.  Whoever had brought them here hadn’t done it for the good of the children.  They had an ulterior motive and he’d bet his bottom dollar that it wasn’t a good one.

 _People who yank kids off the street never have good intentions._   It didn’t take a rocket scientist or even an astrophysicist to figure that out.  Jack had been minding his business, walking near the park after school when a van had ridden up next to him on the street.  He could have outrun almost anyone they had and he would have, if they hadn’t shown him the kid they’d already caught.

Reese Collins was a decent kid.  Whatever they had in mind, she didn’t deserve and she definitely didn’t deserve to go through it alone.  So, he’d dropped his backpack in the hopes that someone would find it and he’d gone without resisting.  Not for the first time, Jack cursed the part of him that would always have a soft spot for lost children.

They were here now, days later and however many hundreds or thousands of miles away from where they’d started.  In the first sixty seconds, the dogs had come out to play and the games had truly begun.  There’d been few places to hide where the dogs couldn’t reach and, so, he’d run.  They’d all run.

It was a goddamned obstacle course; old school, boot camp shit.  There was no way out but through.  Jack had never jumped through so many hoops or dragged himself free of so much quicksand.  Spikes, needles, branches, glass.  He burned in so many places that it was the uninjured spots that ached the most.

Whoever had sent for them wanted them to hurt, but most of all Jack thought they wanted them tough.  _Thin the herd. Separate the wheat from the chaff. Cliché, cliché, cliché._   Someone wanted the fittest to survive and only the fittest.  He didn’t let himself think about what was happening to the rest; he’d already seen.

This was going to be hell on Earth and he hadn’t the slightest idea how he was going to get out.

**…**

Jack landed on solid ground with his good leg and staggered on his bad one.  The bleeding started again, the nausea it brought so strong he would have heaved if he’d recently eaten.  He choked it back and began to move.  The dogs had been quiet for a while now, but he couldn’t say how long.  Somehow the stars had been distracting and the blood loss wearying until sleep was too easy.  Sleep or unconsciousness, he’d felt about as good after a bout of either in the past.  _Yeah, things are looking up all right._

                He looked around at the carnage that had preceded him to the ground. A pile of bodies and pieces of bodies and _there goes that nausea again._ He gave up fighting against the bile and puked.  But not on the kids, never on the kids.  All they had left was the dignity he gave them in death. He could give them that.

                He wiped his mouth and staggered a distance.  He could smell them; more things to dream about and never forget.

The wall they’d crossed had been a few hundred meters long and several meters high.  It was bookended by dense wood on either side. Nothing a few kids with no tools could surmount. The wall was the only final solution and apparently their hosts had had something waiting for the first to make it.  The fall had been too much for Jack to contemplate at the time.  He realized now that he’d gotten damned lucky.  _Guess some things never change even when you’re cloned._

And speaking of clones, he was seriously hoping someone had called Jack – other Jack – to ask about him.  The old man was their only hope and he knew it.  Hope had never gotten him far, but he was still counting on it.  The rest, he figured, was up to them.

_Bring it on, big guys. I’m waiting._

Jack had wanted a challenge that high school couldn’t provide him.  He definitely hadn’t wanted this.

~!~

**Chapter II:  Martial Law**

                Thugs charitably reminiscent of drill instructors melted out of the woodwork around what Jack figured was 2100 local time.  The air had a bite to it and the sky was a blanket of stars.  The sight above was vaguely familiar; he’d been here a long time ago on a mission from Uncle Sam.  He didn’t remember the objective, but he figured it hadn’t been a poker game.

 

~!~

**Chapter III:  The Watchtower**

~!~

**Chapter IV: Band of Brothers**

~!~

**Chapter V:  Whiskey Tango Foxtrot - Tango Uniform**


	6. SG-1: A Series of Goodbyes (a 2010 AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daniel gets the shock of his life when he suddenly finds himself responsible for Jack’s young son following his untimely death. But Janet is less than shocked when she realizes that everything is not what it seems.
> 
> Spoilers: AU for 2010, with references to The Fifth Race, Fragile Balance, and The Lost City among others.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PG-13 rated, Sam/Jack, Daniel/other, Sam/other, Jack/Janet, Janet/other--all implied but mostly gen overall, approx 2000 words, implied character death

[Jack is impervious to the sterilizing effects of anti-aging vaccine. The Asgard Loki created Danny T. O’Neill without permission, but Thor discovered his duplicity and gave Jack the option taking custody of his son before he could be disposed of by the Asgard.  Jack takes Danny to see Janet just after his first birthday—only a few months after he’d gotten him from Thor—and she gives him a clean bill of health.

Jack’s been a thorn in the side of the Aschen authorities from day one and they’re less than thrilled to find that he’s retained the ability to reproduce in spite of being vaccinated.  Jack knows he’s in danger and takes steps to ensure that his son will never fall into Aschen hands.  Through Daniel, Janet, and Teal’c, he plans to protect his son’s life long after he’s gone. By keeping her in the dark, he plans to protect Sam, too.

(Jack makes his wishes known in a series of Asgard-projected holograms. Janet is the first to question whether they’re actual holograms or real-time communication. She keeps her conclusions to herself. Teal’c knows better. Daniel should have. Sam wonders what happens now.)

Daniel is transported to the cabin the moment Jack’s tracker registers failing vital signs. The hologram activates, telling Daniel all he needs to know about where to find Danny T and all the documents he’ll need. Afterwards, Daniel takes Danny home, where the woman who had previously occupied his evening still waits. He makes his excuses and watched the rest of Jack’s final message. His instructions? 

To wait for Janet, who arrives on the heel of the doctor’s visit Jack had brought Danny T to a few weeks prior.  Her orders are to take Danny T out of dodge with all the documents Jack left behind. She doesn’t answer questions, because her oath says to do no harm and she isn’t sure how much of the old Daniel is left. She leaves via ground transport, provided by the sweet Paul Davis, and returns to her professional office. No one goes there often and it’s quiet. She spends the night checking him out and registering out all identifying marks. She watches Jack’s message and following the care and feeding instructions. Noting oddly intuitive hesitations, she has a theory, but she doesn’t ask.

The next morning, more like afternoon, Cassie arrives to pick Janet up for lunch with Sam and it’s a near thing hiding Danny T from their prying eyes.  Janet takes a rain check before quickly consulting the ‘message’—as she has come to think of it—for help.  To Chulak it is for Danny T O’Neill.

Teal’c takes over the child’s care without hesitation and Janet is forced to leave him. Though she knows he’ll be safe, she worries.

Daniel Teal’c, as he is called by Teal’c himself, becomes as another son to him. According to the data disk O’Neill left for him to find, that was the intent.  He is the second child and first son of SG-1.  _Love him as you love Ry’ac, as we all love Cassie, and as I loved Charlie.  That’s all I ask._ And so Teal’c had, until the day that planet’s orbit was filled with the mighty Asgard ship _O’Neill_ once again.

Thor comes personally to take the child and Teal’c allows it, knowing that there is nowhere in the near universe that such a boy would be safe.  He knows who Daniel Teal’c’s mother is and he understands that there is something bigger than him afoot on Earth.

The  time has come to save the Taur’i from themselves yet again.

The next time the remainder of their family comes together is for Jack O’Neill’s funeral.  It’s both agonizing and painful, the distance like cutting blades of glass at their feet, the secrets oddly a balm for the same wounds.

Joe Faxon, Sam’s husband, asks obliquely what became of O’Neill’s son. Janet answers that he’s with family.  Teal’c assents, “Indeed.”

Sam senses the undercurrents and asks what’s going on, asks if they’ve ever met him and what he’s truly like.

“Healthy,” Janet says.

“Cute,” Daniel opines.

“Loud,” Teal’c reflects, amused.

“Ah,” Sam responds, deflating at the realization that she’s the only one not to have to pleasure.  “But, he’s being cared for now? I mean, I didn’t know the colonel had any other family.” She rambles as though embarrassed at how inadequately she’s concealing how much she cares.  “Maybe his mother could use a hand with him.”

Janet lays a hand firmly on Sam’s wrist. “Trust me when I tell you he’s okay. He couldn’t be in safer hands if they were the colonel’s.”

It’s hard to pretend that Jack isn’t the elephant in the room when he is. After all, this is his graveyard.]

  1.        Everyone
  2.        Daniel
  3.        Janet
  4.        Teal’c
  5.        Everyone



 

[Carter finds out the secret the Aschen are keeping and why Jack O’Neill really died.  Just when she’s coming into her own, those close to her make it clear that she’s late to the party. They already know and steps are being taken.

The last thing she learns is that Jack didn’t die, his son is far from Earth, and he’s a son that they share.  The last goodbye she says is to her husband when she leaves. SG-1 and company rides again.]

~!~

**Janet**

                Janet didn’t flinch at the twenty-one gun salute as it sounded. It would have been true, if strange, to say that she’d missed the sound, missed the ceremony. It was just another indicator of a life long gone.  This wasn’t how military funerals were commemorated anymore, another concession made to the honorable Aschen, who didn’t tolerate the jarring reports well.  They’d been forced to devise another way to honor their heroic dead and lost.  She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t bitter about it.

                This was their culture and this had been their world before the Aschen had come.  She resented the fact that they’d had to change something so fundamental to their history to suit the sensibilities of the increasingly-paternalistic race.

                _We forgo our military traditions, we forgo our medical professionals. What else must we forgo to please them?_

                Janet wasn’t oblivious to her own biases; she knew that her thoughts were hardly fair.  The Aschen had saved their bacon in the war against the Goa’uld, a fight that they had been on the cusp of losing outright when SG-1 encountered the incredibly advanced race on P4C-970. They’d also saved humanity from the scourge of cancer and the unavoidable descent of aging.  If Janet felt anything other than a creeping sense of foreboding today, she’d still be ecstatic about all the medical and scientific gains made over the last ten years.

                But foreboding was all Janet felt, so she couldn’t be grateful.  For the first time in a long time, Janet began to wonder if Jack had been right.

~!~

**Daniel**

                Daniel chafed at Kinsey’s bloviating for the umpteenth time in six years.  _He really never gets tired of hearing himself speak,_ he thought with unerring disbelief.  Daniel knew that he himself had a reputation for going on at length on a topic about which he was passionate, but he’d never felt the need to talk about his own exploits with nearly this kind of zeal.  _Jack said he was an asshole with an inferiority complex.  For once, he wasn’t wrong._

                Just as it seemed that Kinsey was gearing up to carry on and just as Daniel was set to begin imagining all the ways this event would have been more entertaining with Jack in attendance

…

~!~

**Teal’c**

~!~

**Sam**

~!~

**Daniel**

                Daniel had the benefit of good company to smooth out the strangeness that had pervaded the day’s celebrations and the day’s reunions.

                A beautiful woman by the name of Talisa was drinking a glass of wine at his side and smiling warmly beneath the candlelight. There was a touch of Shar’e in her eyes that had beckoned him across the crowded dinner club he, otherwise, would have vacated long before. He imagined that it was that touch, that imagined remnant that had convinced him to bring her home with him.

                She seemed to slip easily among his collection of ancient artifacts, to be at peace with his treasure trove of, well, _rocks_ , as Jack would have called them.

…

                Daniel’s heart was racing as he stood in the middle of Jack’s ransacked cabin with his namesake in his arms and the last physical representation of his former best friend that he’d probably ever see flickering before him.

                “It’s time to go now, Danny boy.  There’s nothing good for either of you here and they’re coming. You have to go.”

                “I…” He couldn’t think of a thing to say that would make any difference now.  He hadn’t been able to think of anything to say the last time they spoke in person either.

                “Even when we weren’t friends, Danny, you were still my brother.”  The hologram seemed to be looking right at him and Daniel was blinking harder than he ever had just to memorize the sight of him, because his best friend’s son would never know it.  “Take care of him for me, just for a little while. Doc’ll be by to take him off your hands before long.” 

Jack, this unreal, photonic manifestation of Jack gave a little smile and a wave, his eyes never leaving the place where both Daniels stood, one clutching the other as he cried and the other desperately trying to keep the tears at bay.

“Goodbye, Daniel. And, DT, I love ya, kid.” If he’d been kicked in the chest, Daniel doubted it could have hurt more. Suddenly, there was a stunning whine and eye-piercing light and Daniel had just enough time to look at Jack O’Neill one final time before he wasn’t there at all.

He stumbled as he landed in the study of his condo.  The place was colder than he remembered and even the shirt he’d put on at the cabin failed the thwart the chill.  Danny T immediately began to wail anew and Daniel was helpless to stop him when crying seemed like the sanest option.

He didn’t know what had happened. He didn’t even understand what he’d seen. He simply knew, like he knew languages and recognized love, that something vital to his life had gone.  _Jack’s dead._ Like someone had taken a sledgehammer to the backs of his knees, his legs buckled underneath him. As DT’s distress sharpened, Daniel held him closer and whispered nothings into his tiny ears like he’d seen mothers do once upon a time, as he was sure his mother had when he was small.

“It’ll be okay, Danny. Everything’ll be okay. We’ll take care of you, now.  I know you’re scared, but you’re safe. I promise.” And he meant it.  Deep down, where the love and friendship and loyalty had lived for years and years untouched, he meant it.  Jack O’Neill had entrusted Daniel first and foremost to safeguard his only surviving son.  After everything that had already been lost, that had to mean something.

Daniel stroked the soft curve of DT’s head as he clutched at Daniel’s shirt in fear. “I wish he was here, too. God, I wish he was here.”

Just like that, ten years became water under the bridge and all Daniel wanted back was Shar’e and his best friend.


	7. SG-1: Divergence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack’s last-minute decision to change his speech at Carter’s engagement party has serious consequences for this reality and the next.

                “I’m pretty sure that everyone here is familiar with all the alternate realities we’ve run into by now. I’m also pretty sure you’ve all noticed the common factor—they’re all on in the process of awaiting total and complete annihilation. Yeah, that and me and Carter always seem to have a thing, but that’s not so important,” Jack waved off dismissively.  While he wasn’t sure exactly where he was taking this, he decided to let his mouth run for now.

                “I’ve always noticed that in all these realities, what they don’t have and, yet, desperately need is an Air Force Carter.” He shrugged and looked around at the assembly of colleagues and friends that made up this little shindig.  “I’m sure Doc Carter is wonderful, as Carter would be in any incarnation, but she’s missing something, y’know?  She needs that extra drive, the blue-bleeding incentive to survive and obey orders.  She needs to be Carter and, in all those other realities we’ve seen, she isn’t.”  Jack wet his lips and wondered why this speech suddenly felt so hard.

                “But I can tell you guys what she is. Not that I need to, because you’ve seen her saving our asses—all our asses!—for eight years now.  She doesn’t even break a sweat.  She’s Carter; she’s that brilliant, she’s that tough, and that damned irreplaceable.” He rubbed the back of his neck with the agonizing certainty that he knew what he needed to say and how important it was to say it.  “So, what I want to say in response to what all those other realities have to offer is this.  Even if she’s a Goa’uld and Ori-ass-kicking, laws of physics-defying, so smart it’s terrifying, gorgeous Air Force Lieutenant Colonel—I don’t mind so much not getting the girl as long as I get to keep saving the world with her.”

He waved toward the couple standing in the center of the room, of which Samantha Carter was one.  “Those Carters have nothing on you, Colonel.”  He returned the watery smile she sent his way.  It stung more than it should have.  “I think I speak for all of us out guys out here, Carter, when I say that we may not all get to hold you, but we’re damned glad to have you.”  He didn’t let the words sit long before he lifted the glass that had waited, sweating, in his hand.  “To the bride-to-be, may your future be bright but the past never fade away.”

                “Here here,” sounded first the members of his former team, then all the rest.

                He might have believed he saw tears in her eyes if he could see past the stinging in his own.


	8. SG-1: Hard Masters (a Charlie Lives AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Quantum mix-up brings Jack face to face with a Charlie who accidentally ended his father’s life instead of his own years ago and has lived with the guilt ever since.
> 
> Cold Lazarus, Children of the Gods, and any episodes relevant to Jack’s backstory. There But for the Grace of God for the introduction of alternate realities.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PG-rated, gen, Teal'c, Charlie & Jack-centric, implied character death, approx. 1200 words

                _Guilt is a harsh master for a child_ , Teal’c thought of the young man who occupied the end of the conference table.  He had spoken little since being welcomed by General Hammond and the assembly of SG-1, but the persistent, uneasy tapping of his finger spoke for him.  While Daniel Jackson might have believed that he was simply a man of few words, Teal’c thought otherwise.  The man—boy—who spoke so little introduced himself by no name.  It had been his choice, to assuage the ‘weirdness’ of the situation.  There was no need to know his identity, thus, he had no identity and no designation.  In effect, he was a boy who did not exist—perhaps, least of all, to himself.

~!~

                It had been inevitable that they should meet under circumstances beyond the boy’s control.  He was a guest in this place and carried little authority beyond his area of expertise, which he seemed to instinctively understand.  He pushed no buttons and crossed no boundaries.  He was as adherent of unspoken rules as any occupant of this Cheyenne Mountain.  That did not mean he appreciated the occasion when he was pushed.

                When it happened, he was seated across from Teal’c at a table in the commissary.  He was calmly reviewing borrowed star maps and muttering equations to calculate varied trajectories, vectors, and permutations of the movements of astral bodies.  He gave every indication of having, as O’Neill would have put it, ‘a big honkin’ brain.’  Teal’c believed that O’Neill would have been correct and that he would have been proud. 

As he was considering how to share such an observation with the man in his company, O’Neill had entered the commissary with Daniel Jackson in tow.  Sighting them immediately, Teal’c inclined his head in greeting and nodded at their unspoken request to join him for their meal.  The boy, as observant as he was gifted, noted their silent communication with a wariness belying his age.  He turned slowly to take in the two approaching men.  His unruly fingers stilled around what Teal’c knew to be a compass and protractor, and he clutched them like revered idols.

 _This is not what I intended, but perhaps it is for the best_ , Teal’c mused as O’Neill and Daniel Jackson sat down beside the boy and himself respectively.

Immediately, a protracted silence stole over the table and Teal’c could only raise an eyebrow as it seemed to become as a fifth presence at their gathering.

Daniel Jackson cleared his throat and, with an impressive flutter of his brows, asked the boy about his work.

He stuttered in response, his solemn self-possession vanishing upon direct questioning. He looked to Teal’c imploringly, as though Teal’c would be the one to save him—but Teal’c was not the one.

“Lay off, Daniel. He clearly isn’t comfortable talking about this stuff,” O’Neill said between contented slurps of Jell-O dyed a shade of crimson not seen in nature.

“But it’s his work, Jack. Why wouldn’t he want to talk about it,” Daniel Jackson inquired, somewhat plaintively.  _He fails to understand that even those that share his passion are not as brave as he._

“I don’t know, Daniel, maybe you should ask him. You know, since he’s sitting here.” O’Neill gestured grandiosely toward the boy, who had seemingly attempted to diminish himself in size and slide beneath the table unnoticed.  He had failed.

Daniel Jackson turned toward him and smiled in an apologetic manner.  “Forgive me, I can be,” he gestured aimlessly, “a bit short-sighted about things.  I’m sure you have perfectly valid reasons, I was merely curious.”

“See,” O’Neill carried forth, “he’s perfectly harmless, just a little absent-minded.”  He prodded his dessert in effort to further amuse himself.  “I think it’s a geek thing.”

Daniel Jackson was indignant, as was the boy; their respective brows undulated in time to their dismay.

“There’s nothing wrong with being focused, Jack. In fact, I’d say that some of us at this table could do with a little more focus.”

O’Neill paused in his gelatinous ministrations to consider his friend’s words.  He then began his poking anew.  “You shouldn’t talk about Teal’c that way, Daniel. I mean, right in front of him.  Didn’t anybody ever teach you not to say anything if couldn’t say anything nice?”

~!~

~!~

                “So, kid, you got a name?”

                “Name,” the boy mimicked, with insufficient guile to be convincing and far too much guilt to pass for inconspicuous.

                “Yeah, a name. An ID, a designation. Something you go by? What can I call you?”

                The boy gave a shrug. “Whatever, it’s all the same to me.”

                O’Neill stared at him, exhibiting signs of both frustration and resignation. He, then, shrugged in an identical manner to that of the boy before him.  “Seamus, then. You look like a Seamus.”

                His young counterpart was indignant. “I do not look like Seamus.”

                “You do. I have an Uncle Seamus. I should know.”

                “You’re so full of Seamus, I can’t even…” the younger man retorted with a chuckle.

                “You laughed!” O’Neill accused.

                “Yeah, but it was still dumb.”

                “Doesn’t matter.”

                “Does so.”

But O’Neill was adamant.  “You chuckled; therefore, your argument is invalid.”

                “I had an argument? You had one? It didn’t sound like it to me.”

                O’Neill put down his eating utensil in a show of false astonishment.  “You’re a mouthy one, aren’t you?”

                “Get it from my parents,” he replied with a wink.

                “Speaking of parents, yours just let you go trotting around…existence to different realities whenever you feel like?”

                The young man with no name shrugged once more.  _He has not yet composed a sufficient response to this query. He should, quickly._  “Dad’s dead and mom just wants me to stick around. She doesn’t ask much.”

                O’Neill nodded slowly, his expression one of sympathy and suppressed grief.

 

 

 

                “My dad died when I was nine.”

                “What happened?”

                “I was a stupid kid and he was one of those dads who just couldn’t keep from trying to save me from myself.”

                “Charlie O’Neill, you do not need to attempt to deceive me any longer.”

                “I never had you fooled, did I?”

                “You did not.”

 

 

                “We need our expert back ASAP, General.”

                “We still require his assistance here.”

                “Us allowing you to borrow him was a courtesy. We’ve got a bona fide emergency here.”

                “I hear you. I’ll relay that message.”

 


	9. SG-1: For Love or Duty (a 2010 AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack’s finally living the life he’s always wanted and Sam has to decide whether saving the future is worth taking away everything he loves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> G-rated, Sam/Jack UST implied, gen overall, approx 1100 words

                Sam finally got around to looking at Daniel’s vacation pictures last night.  He’d been a little bit of everywhere since he’d officially resigned from the SGC early in the year.  In a matter of months, he’d be taking office as the foremost interplanetary ambassador for the Aschen, but for just a while longer he’d wanted to see the places he’d loved as just a man, as just Daniel.  So, he’d done just that.

                His first stop had been Abydos and there he’d stayed longest. It had been home once, he’d told her in a rare vid communication recently, it was the least he could do to ensure that it was in one piece.  It was—in one piece, that is—and in grains of sand and ruins and monuments.  In the pictures of him there she saw that his eyes still brightened at the sight of the people, and still reddened in memory of what had been lost.  Sam wasn’t sure he’d ever come to peace with the past but she loved him so much more for trying so hard.

                He’d even returned to Ernest’s Planet, travelling by way of _Prometheus_ to see what had become of the temple that had so enthralled him then. For the most part it was gone, destroyed by nature and time, yet he remained in orbit for days, convincing the ship’s personnel to scan and record as much as the structure as possible for future study.  _The patron saint of Lost Causes_ , she thought, flipping to a picture of him poring over the scans with all the intensity of his early days.

                Many of his pictures were that way: glimpses of the Daniel Jackson he used to be, guileless and somewhat naïve, overcome at what treasure went unnoticed due to a mere language barrier.  He was that Daniel for a few months more and she, like him, wondered if he’d ever be again.  She didn’t like to think of him, or any of the people who’d once been a part of her life, this way, but she couldn’t help feeling that they had changed—and not for the better.

                Since their initial contact with the Aschen, things on Earth had moved quickly. This new and advanced race had been the silver bullet in their fight against the Goa’uld. While not eradicated, they were certainly weaker and no longer perceived as a threat by Earth or the Tok’ra, though the Asgard remained vigilant of their activity.  For all intents and purposes, Earth was saved and their victory had come with great reward. Unfortunately, it had also come with great cost, which Sam could attest to personally.

                Finally, after reminiscing over what felt like every planet they had visited as a team, Daniel had returned to do his last and most important rounds. These were the photos she had been half-heartedly dreading.  Her team, her family, and their lives without her.

                Teal’c with his son and the woman who had become his wife.  Ishta stood strong beside him, a warrior without doubt, and their daughter who, even at her young age, gave every indication of being the same.  Although he still did not smile, Sam knew that, were he anyone else, he would have beamed.  A greater peace than she had ever known had enveloped him there—how she wished she could share it.

                She grinned tremulously through the pictures of Janet with a growing, blooming Cassie and the man she’d be marrying sometime soon. It had been weeks since they’d spoken, but it felt like years.  Time seemed to move beyond the speed of light now, sonic booms sounding every other second at her back.  She’d been avoiding the inevitable for so long, forestalling the undesirable so intensely that she had forgotten that she was only human and that time forfeited for no woman or man.

                Twisting the knob just so, she came to the face of her discontent.  Only hers, because he was smiling.  With an arm thrown around Daniel and the other occupied with the center of his world, Jack O’Neill was smiling so widely he was nearly unrecognizable to someone who’d known him before. Daniel had the makings of a scowl on his face and another twist showed him being the recipient of a playful noogie that disturbed the dignified air he’d perfected in recent years.  Didn’t matter, the former colonel didn’t seem to care, but the little boy peering from the corner of the frame was clearly entertained when the dispute turned to full-blown wrestling on the grass.

                _He would be_ , Sam mused without a hint of malice.  He was a small but hearty boy with quick brown eyes and hair an off-kilter shade of blond.  She found herself thinking of it as strawberry when she’d always imagined it as dishwater.  She supposed that descriptions had never done him justice.

                There weren’t really words for a boy like him. In the next picture, curled into the roomy trunk of a tree in an apparent game of hide and seek, he was the epitome of adorable.  Unbeknownst to him, the colonel and Daniel were peeking around both sides of the tree and Sam was nearly sad knowing that the jig was up.  He had his hands over his mouth and his eyes squeezed tight shut.  He’d probably thought he was being as quiet as a mouse.

But even mice squeak—and he was caught!

He wiggled in his father’s arms while willing accomplice Daniel tickled his ribs.  She knew his laugh as well as she knew the jaw-breaking grin on his face, even if she’d never seen or heard either in person. He was his father’s son.

                She danced her fingers over his freckled face on the view screen and had to fight down a bout of envy masquerading as nausea in her gut. She wished she could have been there with them that day or any day.  God, she missed her family.

                She still thought of them that way even though politics and personal loyalty had put them at odds long ago and still to some extent divided them.  There was love there but they didn’t come together anymore. It’d be an emotional nightmare and Sam could do without that now.

                That didn’t mean she didn’t wish…

~!~

                The picture of the Daniel, the colonel, and his son was still up on the view screen when night fell.

 Sam was poring over confidential reports detailing the ongoing effort to terraform the planet Earth to Aschen standards.  By morning, Sam had accrued a growing list of concern about the effect of terraforming on the human race.  She put it down to having so recently spent time with Janet that she wasn’t able to take the Aschen’s vague assurances that they’d set all possible contingencies. This didn’t feel right.


	10. SG-1: The Old Gang (an apocalypse AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SG-1 undertakes one last mission and finds everyone they lost along the way right where they left them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time travel, end of the world stuff, gen, approx 500 words

                They’d made a pact twenty years ago, before they’d been scattered to the corners of the known universe, to meet up back in time.  They hadn’t known then how they’d manage it, but they’d known that they had to.  Too many things had been waiting to go wrong and they’d been resigned to the role of mere spectators as carnage and desolation overwhelmed the worlds they loved and all they knew.  As they’d known it would be, it was already too late to prevent it, but, thankfully, it was never too late to undo it.

~!~

                Jack landed on Othalla with a lot less grace than he was used to. Maybe it was the years he wore like a heavy velvet cloak, maybe it was all the time that’d gone by since he last so much as dreamed of a wormhole; he couldn’t say. He just remembered that he used to be better at this whole intergalactic traveler bit and it showed.

~!~

                _It was frighteningly easy to overcome the base computer_.  That was the first thing that flashed through Sam’s mind as she landed on the gateroom ramp at the SGC.  The entire contingent of SFs didn’t do much to deter her or even intimidate her.  She supposed after she’d survived the apocalypse without a lot to show for it, a few measly airmen with MP-15s just wasn’t that impressive.  Either way, her mind had already begun resolving new ways to beef up Earth’s last line of intergalactic defense.

~!~

                Daniel didn’t stumble into Abydos as he might have done thirty years before.  He wasn’t the coordinated creature he’d been in his best days—and those were long behind him—but he didn’t stumble anymore.  The stinging inhalation of sand didn’t deign to send him into coughing fits, even if it really did still sting, at any age.  He had adapted from his first days until today…tomorrow. He tried not to get entrapped in the details and was partially successful.

                It was a relief and somewhat of a surprise when his Good Father recognized him.

                “You have aged, Danyel,” he said with a touch of humor and not a little fear.

                “Indeed,” he replied and sorely missed his old friend.

~!~

                Teal’c opened his eyes and saw the visible midday moon of Chulak above him.  It was a bittersweet thing to know that it was the moon under which his father had died and his son lived.  He had never seen it again in his lifetime after being relegated to the life of a human acquisition on Earth. They would not allow him to return to his home planet, but neither would they allow him to venture forth and find his true path among the Tau’ri.

                For the rest of his already protracted life, Teal’c lived as Murray Thomas amid the constrained wilderness of Colorado Springs, Colorado.

                But not now.

                _And,_ he vowed, _never again_.

~!~


	11. SG-1: Solitude & Memoirs (an SGC goes public AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They’d known each other for seven years and it hadn’t been love. Now that they’re both on to bigger and better things like solitude and memoirs, that’s all it is. But it’s hard to fall in love for the first time when the world is watching. (They never managed to prevent the SGC from going public.) It starts with an evening as just friends and ends as the affair everyone already thought they were having.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PG-rated, Sam & Jack-centric, approx 2000 words

                Sam Carter had learned not to park in her drive way after a particularly enthusiastic photographer had decided that clinging to the undercarriage of her Volvo was the best way to find out where she was headed.  In the end, she hadn’t been liable for his injuries, but she’d apparently gotten a reputation for running down the press. Unsurprisingly, that had only induced more of them flock to her front door.

                Now, she parked down the block and around the corner, under a neighbor’s carport.  The elderly woman was sympathetic to her plight and didn’t even charge her for the courtesy.  Sam didn’t bother to wonder how long that would last.  Courtesy often went out of the window when there was profit to consider.

                For the time being, she was grateful, even for the block hike she had to make from her car door to her back door every evening after work.  The stargate might have been public knowledge but she still had a job to do.  Work was the only time she got a reprieve from the madness and she found herself delaying coming home more and more each day.

                This time, it had been three days since she’d last left the mountain and she already wished she hadn’t.

                Entering through her back yard gate, she checked around her lawn furniture for intruders. That was more than habit, she was well aware of the fact that the media wasn’t exactly observant of ‘no trespassing’ signs.  If they were in the area, she’d know and be sorely pressed not to shoot them on sight.  _I need to get a dog._ She wondered if they could be trained to gnaw on reporters.  _Not to kill,_ she rationalized, _just to maim_.

                She observed more than a few questionable disturbances in her flower bed; a handful of gardenias had been overturned and— _what_?—it looked like someone had started weeding.  She rolled her eyes and, keeping her hand on her service weapon, pulled out her house keys.  The NID might have been long gone but she’d never learned to stop expecting them.

                Once inside, she made sure all the entrances and exits were secure before locking the place up tight.  The situation had gotten so that she was more afraid of those after a story than those after her blood.  _Doesn’t help that there are more of the former than there used to be._

                She dropped onto her couch while the messages from her voicemail played.  First one was a bill collector. _I pay all my bills through direct deposit. Try harder, ‘In Touch Magazine.’_   Second one was Columbia University. They wanted her to give a talk on theoretical astrophysics.  _Not anytime soon. Thanks._   Sam wasn’t quite ready to set foot outside of the Springs in this media climate.  Third one was junk and summarily ignored.  Fourth one was muffled and she nearly ignored that one, too, until she recognized the long-suffering inflection.

                “Hey, Carter. It’s…me, obviously.  Just wondering how you’re handling this whole ‘reveal’…thing.  I can’t leave the house. I’m _not_ going to Minnesota; no way am I leading them up to the cabin.”

  _As if they aren’t already there_ , she thought sympathetically.  No doubt the colonel knew that and was choosing denial as his coping mechanism.

“My truck is like ground zero for this swarm of locusts. I feel like putting on war paint every time I go out to get the mail.  What the hell do I do with myself?”

                Sam listened with some amusement as he grumbled to the world at large prior to letting out another huge sigh.

                “I’m bored and there’s no one here.  Danny’s up to his ears in public appearances. T’s skipped off to Ch—home for an alleged romantic getaway with Ishta.  I, for one, think that’s a load of bunk, but good on him for thinking of it first.  _I_ am sitting in my living room being bored.  Carter, if you’re as bored as I am, _please_ pick up. I beg of you.”

                Smirking, she rolled over and stopped the message from continuing to play.  She tapped re-dial and waited for the recipient phone to ring.  It rang four or five times before her CO picked it up.

                “You rang, sir?”

                “Oh, thank God. I thought you were _People Magazine_ again. I don’t even know how they got my number—I’m not even listed!”

                “Me neither, sir. Guess they’re working a little Google magic.”

                He blew out a noisy breath, audibly dropping back onto his couch. Sam turned onto her stomach and waited, comfortably, for him to find something to talk about.

                “I can’t watch hockey.”  She could all but hear his sulking across the phone line.

                “Why not, sir?”

                “Too worried I’ll miss one of those damned reporters trying to sneak into my attic to enjoy the game. The volume is at least half the fun.”

                “Of course it is, sir.”  Oh, the headaches she’d gotten from those team hockey nights. She couldn’t bear to think of them on top of the one she was already sporting.

                “I feel like I’m being patronized, Major. Is that what this is?”  She was too sure he was smiling, as much as he ever smiled.

                “If I say ‘yes,’ sir?”

                “I’ll say that’s exactly what I’m looking for and please do carry on.”

                “Then, I shall, sir.”  Sam stretched cat-like from head to toe.  All this constant attention had made her tense.

                “Sweet.”

                She curled up lazily, absently toeing off her boots and wiggling her stiff toes.  A bath would have been more than nice.  She was pretty sure, however, that she’d fall asleep in the water and drown if she tried it.  _Not what I want written in my obituary.  ‘Decorated Air Force Major and Theoretical Astrophysicist forgets that it only takes an inch of water to drown and naps in two feet of the stuff instead. Brains are apparently no substitute for common sense.’_   Sam growled at the very idea.

                “You all right there, Carter?” the colonel asked, interrupting the increasingly cracky train of thought she was on.  _God, I need sleep._

                “Yes, sir, just easily distracted today.”

                “I figured. You’ve gotta be exhausted with all those briefings you’re doing with the eggheads from…wherever.”  She couldn’t even work up a good fit of righteous indignation at his classic anti-intellectual dig.

                “Yes, sir. Wherever is right. I’ve honestly given up on remembering who’s from where.  They want a demonstration of every scientific advancement we’ve made over the last seven years and I don’t have that kind of time.”

                “They should just read your notes and lab reports.”

                Sam threw her arm over her eyes. “That’s exactly what I said. Apparently, that doesn’t meet their ‘burden of scientific proof,’” she mimicked derisively.  She had gone from nervously anticipatory to actively antagonistic with her fellow scientists in a matter of a half-hour.  She understood being wary of anyone who claimed to turn the laws of both physics and thermodynamics inside out, but it made no sense to refute, in her opinion, well-documented evidence.  “God, I hate scientists.”

                The colonel sounded off something akin to a giggle.  Sam boggled, and not just at herself for repeating his age old complaint.

                “Sir, did you just giggle?”

                “No,” he denied stridently.  Then, he did it again.  “I did not, categorically am not-” he chuckled “-giggling.”

                “Sir, I think I am honor-bound to remind you of our strict ‘no giggling’ policy.”

                “Oh, it’s a policy now?”

                “It’s always been a policy, sir. You’ve made it quite clear that giggling is a detriment to good order and discipline.”

                “Carter, since when have I ever been disciplined?”

                Dimpling up at the ceiling, Sam had no choice but to respond, “Colonel, you’re the most disciplined man I know.”

                “Speaking of loads of bunk…Carter, what are you up to tonight?”

                In spite of him being unable to see her, she shrugged.  “Nothing much, sir.  Probably some TV, a frozen dinner, and sleep.”

                “No nitpicking over science journals? Color me shocked.”

                “No, sir. I’ve had enough peer-reviewing for the rest of my career.  They can figure out how wrong they are on their own from now on.”

                “Sooo, does that mean you’d be up for a movie or something?  If I stay in the house for another night, I will go clock tower nutty on the paps parked on my street, so help me God.”

                “Only if I can borrow your rifle after, sir.”  Sam sat up to reach for her boots. Given the option between going and staying, she’d much rather go.  _The bubble bath will still be there later._

                “That’s a yes, then?”

                “Yes, sir.  I’ll pick you in fifteen.  I think I stand a better chance of getting to my car unnoticed than you do.”  She gave her zippers a last tug and stood up.

                He seemed to consider, then gave his assent. “Sure, yeah. I’ll be waiting with bells on.”

                “Yes, sir,” she smiled and signed off.  She grabbed her keys and, running a quick hand through her hair, headed out the way she’d come.

                Her CO had the right idea tonight. She wasn’t in the mood to be alone either.

~!~

                Sam parked her car near the start of the hiking trail behind the colonel’s house.  She’d had to go the roundabout way to get there and avoid the press at the same time, but she figured it was worth it to save them both from the inevitable rumors.  If there was anything they’d had enough of in their time as teammates, it was rumors.

                With a brief call to inform the colonel of her arrival, Sam had nothing more to do than sit back and wait.  She turned up the volume on the radio to sing along to a song that she was quite sure was older than she was.  _The colonel probably knows the words, too_ , she thought somewhat wickedly.  There was a hell of an age gap between them but she liked to think that had never stopped them from being close.

                _Dance with me_

_Oh, won’t you be my partner_

_Can’t you see?_

_The music is just starting_

_Night is falling_

_And I am calling_

_Dance with me_

While Sam was hardly one for sappy music on a regular basis, she had her moments.  She grinned as the disc jockey switched from ‘Dance With Me’ to ‘Still the One.’  She lost herself in those lyrics, too, until a rather loud knock on her driver side window jarred her out of her one-woman jam session.

                Her hand going immediately to the sidearm she never left the house without, Sam leaned forward to peer into the growing dark.  _It had better not be one of those damned reporters._   She hadn’t been fond of them since that Donovan woman and the _Prometheus_ incident.

                Luckily, it was just the colonel.  She smiled and unlocked the passenger door.  With a wink, he slid across her hood and got inside.  He grumbled and groused as he made himself comfortable in her somewhat cramped vehicle before settling down and setting his head back against the headrest.  He lolled it her way, she grinned.  He grinned right back.

                “So, what’re we seeing?”

                “No idea, sir. Don’t even know what’s playing.”

                He quirked an eyebrow in evident disbelief.  “And you didn’t check?”

                She frowned a little then shrugged without any real guilt. “Not my idea, Colonel.”

                “Duly noted,” he conceded after some thought.  “What do ya say we just go with the flow?”

                “All for it, sir.”  Sam was about to pull out when she noted that her CO had yet to fasten his seat belt.  “Sir, either buckle up or walk,” she nodded toward the strap hanging near the door.

                He fretted but did as she advised.  “Whenever you’re ready, Major.”

                She started her baby up and they were out of there.  If any of the photographers that seemed to so eager to snap shots of them were around, Sam hadn’t noticed them.  She was looking to have a good time for the first time in a while.   There were bigger things to worry about tonight—like Sweet Tarts and popcorn.  And she had no idea who was buying.

                But, Sam didn’t care so much about that, because she had a feeling that tonight was going to be pretty sweet either way.

~!~

 

               


	12. Work In Faith (Special Ops Barbie AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three years ago, Sam performed the most damned distasteful act of her career when she carried out her orders to eliminate Charlie O’Neill. Now, three years later, that act has come back to haunt her. Because she’s falling for the father he left behind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> rated PG-13, Sam & Jack-centric, includes references to child death/murder, possibly super OOC, dark, angsty, approx 2400 words

                She’d been raised to be dangerous.  Her father probably hadn’t meant to make her so, simply trying to turn any shared time they’d had during her childhood into quality time.  The first time a boy stuck gum in her hair, he’d taught her how to put the fear of god into him with just her words. The first time that same boy had kissed her, he’d given her a crash course in how to tell a boy no and put the fear of god into him with her fists if her words failed.  The boy had asked her to be his valentine afterward.  Jacob Carter had rolled his eyes and Sam had decided right then that boys, big and small, were weird and should be avoided.  Dad had been overjoyed.

                He was less overjoyed at her choice in fiancée. Jonas Hanson was a man who’d dragged her from her job slaving away in the bowels of the Pentagon on a project that would never the see the light of day to a field that definitely never saw the light of day.  With all her father had told her, Sam Carter definitely should have stayed away from Black Ops. With all Jonas made it his job to teach her, she couldn’t see going anywhere else. She was made for this.

                Every day was a new challenge. Find a new way to get in and get out without being seen. Find a new way to convince men too powerful for the good of the Free World to let their guards down.  Find a new way to clean blood off her hands without leaving epithelial cells behind.  She was particularly good at that.

                She and Jonas had started off as a matched set of opposites attracting; she all light where he was dark.  The longer they were together, though, the less the difference.  She hadn’t minded that so much, someone had to be the monster and Sam had followed willingly while he led.  They were similarly pragmatic minds, always aware that the decision made for the Greater Good was not always the better or easier one to make.  They’d cracked each other’s rose-colored glasses and threw away the shards.  He had made a harder woman of her and she had made him indestructible.

                They were still neck-deep and drowning in love the day she walked away.  He never understood why and years went by before she did.

~!~

                She’d waited in a tree of their neighbor’s backyard for twelve hours.  Her ass was numb and her knees had surpassed sore to reach a stage of persistent aching.  At least it meant she wouldn’t fall asleep and fall out of the tree. There was a dog bowl down there and a treasure trove of squeak toys. She didn’t think her ego could stand that kind of indignity.

                She wasn’t exactly worried about being found here. Experience had taught her that people tended not to look too hard at their surroundings when they felt safe.  This was their home, why should they feel anything less than utterly secure? In the back of her mind, she felt a little sorry for sullying their sanctuary this way, but needs must….

                _Fifteen minutes_ , she reminded herself. Fifteen minutes and she could get the hell out of dodge, go home and crawl in bed with Jonas for a week.  She probably wouldn’t stay the entire week since the Stargate Project was due to go live anytime now and they’d need her, but the idea—she loved the idea of it.

                Sam brought the bedroom window upstairs into her cross hairs for the second time in the last ten minutes.  The window was open, the work of the unseen operative who’d acted prior to her arrival.    She noted an unsecured lockbox sitting on the dresser and frowned.  It didn’t seem in keeping with the studied neatness of the place, but she figured that everyone slipped up sometime.

                With an eye on her watch, she slowed down her breathing and prepared to get down to business.  She kept her eye to the scope and began counting down the last few minutes in her head. The target would enter and approach the lockbox. That was when she’d take the shot.  It’d be easier to get them at the door, but then it would also be clear it was a takedown.

                Sam could hear the super-duty pickup as it was parked in the driveway.  She could hear the door open and close, heavy boots and lights steps crossing the grass.  She could hear…She closed her eyes and listened to the quiet banter that came with love and marriage and knowing you’d come home.  Without meaning to, she smiled.  Jonas sometimes made her feel that way.

                She was still distracted by the score of absent kisses and sultry chuckles when the door to the bedroom opened in her scope.  She didn’t watch, knowing it would take a second for the mark to reach prime position.  Her instincts pulled her through the motions as one ear remained focused on the sound of the couple on the front porch.  It didn’t occur to her until she was about to take the shot that neither adult was anywhere near the bedroom.

                Her lungs seized up at the sight of the young boy turning the handgun wondrously in his hands.  He looked at it the way she looked at her motorcycle, like it was art.  _He has no idea._ _She’_ d had no idea.  She could hardly breathe. This was—she couldn’t, how could she?

                The face of her watch began to flash a fluorescent green in her periphery.  It was zero hour.

                Neither of the adults was the target, it was him. A little boy, her country had targeted a little boy for elimination and made her their kill-switch.

                She wanted to jump the fence and climb the side of the house to pull the weapon out of his hands. _He has no idea._ And he wouldn’t, because if that gun wasn’t faulty, Sam wasn’t Black Ops.

                90 seconds passed and she hadn’t taken the shot. She was waiting for his parents to find him, to stop being so preoccupied with each other that they didn’t see the danger over head. _Find him, find him_ , she chanted nearly out loud.  She could have killed them for not seeing what they weren’t supposed to see.

                He turned the thing toward himself in hapless demonstration of what never to do with a gun. His clumsy fingers caught on the trigger guard and then on the loose trigger as he nearly dropped it. Sam’s finger twitched in time to the sound and their bullets landed nearly in tandem.

                _It’ll be over faster this way. Please, let it end faster this way._

                She’d hear that little sound he’d made in her sleep, hear the rampaging steps of his parents as they raced up the stairs every time a door slammed from now on.

                Probably.

                She’d deserve it.

                Unable to make herself stay to see the aftermath, Sam scrambled down the tree and past the dog, who’d gone nuts at the cry of the handgun next door. Her weapon had been silenced, no more audible than the displacement of air.

                She felt sick. Her knees shook for the duration of her mad dash out of the red zone.  Her palms were cold and clammy and she couldn’t stop gagging. The adrenaline was making her want to vomit, but nothing would come.  She hadn’t eaten this morning, knowing that her nerves would make her nauseous and nausea would make her inaccurate.  She’d always sublimated her own needs to the needs of the mission.

                This had been necessary. This had been the cost levied for the Stargate Project to be reinstated.  She just…hadn’t realized it would be a child.

                She’d been given a time and a location. She had taken her shot.  It had killed more certainly than anything the little boy could have done to himself.  Her specialized bullet would disintegrate amid the biological material and the only thing left would be the shell from what she supposed was his father’s gun.

                _I can’t do this anymore, I can’t do this._ _Can’t do this, can’t do this, can’t do this._

                This couldn’t have gone down any other way, they’d tell her when it came time to debrief.  She knew it already and she’d know it for the rest of her life.

What she didn’t know, though, was why she couldn’t stop shaking.

Sam realized that maybe it was time for a career change.

~!~

_Children of the Gods_

                Three years later, Captain Samantha Carter no longer talked about her time in Black Ops.  She no longer had a fiancé named Jonas and she no longer spoke to her father.  She’d thrown herself wholeheartedly into her work with the stargate and she was never looking back.

                Although she’d been pissed to be denied a place on the first excursion through the gate, she’d been gratified when her new commanding officer had finally accepted her on the first official mission afterwards.  Colonel Jack O’Neill was an enigma wrapped in a riddle, to use the old cliché.  He played at being open with his humor but was a closed a book as they came.  He liked women well enough but had no use for scientists.  He was precise about everything except tradition.

                She liked him and he adored her already.

                Try though she might, she had a feeling this was going to be a problem.

~!~

_Broca Divide_

                It was a problem.

                She was out of her head with an alien virus, sprouting hair in embarrassing places, and acting out her fantasies in public.

                The colonel had a body of tense, unyielding planes and his lips were no more forgiving in that respect.  His hands while she touched him were at turns cautious and grasping, his mouth resisting and acquiescent.

                She’d wanted surrender and he’d given her common sense.

                Afterwards, she’d spent many nights embarrassed by how much she remembered and how much he clearly did. She was fairly sure they’d never be discussing their little infected detour to the supply room in Level 19 any time soon, if ever.

                That was for the best, definitely.

                Also, _definitely_ a problem.

~!~

_First Commandment_

                And then there was Jonas.

                She’d known he was there, here, on-base.  Different team, different worlds it felt like at times.  Their paths didn’t cross often, but when they did all he wanted to talk about was the past.  Sam didn’t, she never wanted to talk about that again.  The thought of it made her too bitter, too sad.  She had to live in this Air Force, salute it, and be proud of it.

                She couldn’t do that if she couldn’t stand the sight of stars and eagles and even the bars on her own shoulders.  Damned distasteful things were a part of her past and that’s where she wanted them to stay. If that meant she had to leave Jonas there, too, so be it.

                That left her wondering, in the aftermath, if she could have saved a few lives if she’d just been more willing to listen.  He’d hardly been in the lunatic fringe alone; listening was the least she could have done.  But if she’d listened, she was afraid she wouldn’t have only heard him, but the sounding of two guns, a dog, and a mother who wouldn’t stop screaming.

~!~

_Brief Candle_

                And then she couldn’t breathe because he was dying. Not Jonas, not the man she’d loved so darkly the first time; the one who had her now. It was cake and not love and some kind of marriage.  She couldn’t decide who she was angrier at; him for taking it, the girl for giving it, or herself for not intervening at all.  He was wasting away and she couldn’t see how to save him. He was wasting away and the feeling is like watching Jonas die all over.

                She just wanted to go back to yesterday, she just wanted to do this again but right!  But if she’d gone backwards every time something went wrong, she’d never have been here at all. So, all Sam could do was work like her life depended on it and pray that what had gone around didn’t come back around quite yet.

~!~

_Cold Lazarus_

                Sam didn’t say a word on the ride back from the hospital.  She’d thought she’d been slowly suffocating when the colonel had eaten that damned cake and was dying of old age by hours rather than decades.  Now, she was out of air and words and courage.  He’d see through her if she spoke, she knew he’d see through her.  So, she said nothing and tried not to look at the face of the boy whose life she’d ended.

                _He was a beautiful little boy_.  He had grey eyes like his mother and every bit of his quiet confidence was his father.  Even if he wasn’t real, even if he was just an alien facsimile of everything that boy had been, Sam couldn’t deny that she was sitting in a car with Charles Jonathan O’Neill.  Here with the boy and the father who mourned him so thoroughly he’d nearly taken his own life.

                _This is the price we paid to make the stargate a reality._

                And as she watched him say goodbye again to the being that was both closure and renewed heartbreak in one, Sam couldn’t say it had been worth it. Not at all.

                Her secret wasn’t just a secret anymore; it was alive and living right beside her every day.

                This was the mother of all problems and it was bound to get worse.  Because if he looked at her once more as though she could make this better, she just might try.

~!~


	13. SG-1: The Living Mark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ‘Everyone thinks that Daniel is the one that gets around, but Jack's the only one who's slept with the other three members of the original SG-1 and at least one of the new members.’ These are the other three.
> 
> Pairings: Jack/Jonas, Jack/Cam, Jack/Vala

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rated Mature, Jack-centric, I suppose something in here could be considered infidelity but it's not clear

**Jonas**

Jack thinks that something in him must have broken when Daniel left because he doesn't feel nearly as bad about this as he should.  Jonas is eager to please him even though Jack knows he's been damned intolerable for months now.  All isn't forgiven and probably won't ever be, but the kid's been trying so hard that he's gotta give him something in return.  It's just his nature; Jack hates owing debts.

 

So he invites the kid over one night when Teal'c is off visiting Rya'c and can't come, and for obvious reasons Carter shouldn't. (Not that that's ever stopped him before, but he tries not to think about that.)  Jack vouches for the team's newest alien with the general and endures a drive filled to the brim with excited questions telegraphed by a body that thrums so alive it makes Jack himself feel a few years younger by the time he sees home.

 

He's got the steaks marinating in the fridge, just ready for the grill and the beer is chilled.  He's got hockey and the Simpsons and specials on the century's worst and weirdest weather for Jonas.  _Kid's got weird taste,_ he thinks _,_ but he enjoys the documentaries more than he expects. He'd lived through some of that. Jonas seems to know that, knows more about Jack than Jack even remembers and it makes him wonder where he gets his info.  But his gut doesn't clinch and his neck doesn't tingle, so he doesn't worry. His instincts have hardly led him wrong and he won’t stop trusting them now.

 

He hands Jonas his third beer as an old game Jack's already seen kicks into high gear. Jonas is enthralled, or he does a good job of pretending to be.  Jack's not fooled; he sees the younger man's fingers twitch around the bottle, the nervous bobbing of his Adam's apple, and the way his gaze'll twitch towards Jack before returning to the screen.  He looks like he might break before Jack ever touches him and, well, they can't have that.

 

Jack swishes around a mouthful of Guinness before he swallows, leaning back in his easy chair with a sigh. He could wait all night, but he'd rather not.  Jonas is on the edge of the couch, folded elbows on knees, and eyes on the screen without blinking. Jack doubts he's seen the last few minutes of the game, his cheers always come a millisecond too late for someone watching that closely.

 

And maybe that's what makes him do it.

 

He's losing Jonas little by little with every word he doesn't say and he doesn't want that.  Daniel definitely wouldn't want that and isn't all this about pleasing the memory of him? _Maybe it is, maybe it isn't._

 

He nudges Jonas' ankle with a booted foot anyway and smirks behind his beer when he nearly leaps out of his skin.

 

"Scared ya?" he asks and it isn’t really a question.

 

Jonas smiles a little, eyes wide, and Jack just has to know who made somebody that smart so damned timid. It reminds him too much of a young Daniel and he wants to kill these bastards like he wanted to kill those that used to terrorize him. _Nobody hurts one of mine_ , he thinks, and he finds he means it more than he would have even earlier today. Jonas is one of his.

 

Having that confirmed by his own conscience takes a little of the weight off and he puts down the beer to offer his hand.  Jonas can take it or not, he could leave right now and Jack wouldn’t be upset in the least. Jonas will still be one of his in the morning, whether or not he is tonight; he hopes Jonas realizes that, too.

 

Whatever the case, he doesn’t say, but he has Jack back in his seat a blink after their hands first touch.  Although Jonas is straddled awkwardly over his thigh and his knee is just a little too close for comfort to the family jewels, what he obviously doesn’t have in experience he makes up with enthusiasm.

 

He kisses Jack before he realizes it’s what he wants, tipping his head against the headrest and sweeping his tongue in for a taste.  They miss clashing teeth by millimeters and Jonas is immediately distracted tracing Jack’s bottom of lip with the tip of his tongue.   Jack fights a smirk; that lip has always been a draw for his lovers and he supposes Jonas is no different.

 

  _Was I ever this young_ , he asks himself when Jonas’ wandering fingers tug a little too readily at his hair. He growls a wordless warning and has to suppress a shudder when, in response, Jonas only tugs again, and harder.  _Not so timid, I hear ya_.  He can feel the heat flare up under his skin everywhere they touch.  He wants to know what he missed in dismissing Jonas Quinn.  He wants to find the flicker of a flame that hurts good and make it burn.

 

He’s good at that, burning people inside and out, and burning bridges.  He can burn them right to the ground with the very best of men and build them up into whatever he wants out of the ashes. It’s almost cruel.  He won’t lie, that’s exactly why he likes it.

 

Jack’s never been a good man, but he’s nearly always gotten his way.

 

Tonight, he wants Jonas—his way.

~!~

**Cam**

                Cam thinks Jack O’Neill put the hero in hero worship. He’s a God among men and that’s saying something coming from the grandson of a bible thumper.  Cam didn’t get to be in the thick of the Goa’uld fight, he never really saw how false idols walked the earth, but secretly he thinks it couldn’t have been too different from the way Major General Jack O’Neill stalks the halls of the SGC when he’s in town.  Spines straighten, eyes rise in recognition or lower in deference, and the salutes are sincere even when they’re contrary to regulations.  Whether he’s in old BDUs or drenched in blue, there isn’t a person below NORAD who doesn’t know his fruit salad like name, rank, and serial number. Hell, Cam is damned near sure he knows them better than that.

                Back when he was trying to get the gang back together and then lead them, he’d breathed that man’s mission reports.  It wasn’t about the scientific detail or the cultural discovery, but about leading from the front and being willing to die from the front.  He’d nearly given his life for the general (then-colonel) in Antarctica, now he’d be giving his life for the man’s team and he needed to know the legend in his own words.

                O’Neill hadn’t ever lied and pretended to be a scholar, he’d never proclaimed any genius—though  Cam thought those might have been the most grammatically-flawless mission reports he’d ever laid eyes on, Sam’s included—yet there’d been something in the words that shouted all the things he’d never pretend to be.  He was a keen observer of human nature, he was god of war when he had to be, and he was a hero who’d give back every medal in a second to never have to do it again.  He’d had Cam’s undying respect before they so much as shook hands and he’d kept it.

                It’s long after that first contact and the thrill is mostly gone nowadays, but there’s still something about the general that makes Cam stand on ceremony and it’s not his training.  Though the hair’s gone straight silver and the way the service dress has settled on him makes him look more desk jockey than field commander, Jack O’Neill can clearly still kick his ass and Cam has to admit that he still thinks the man is too damned cool.  But the feeling is getting complicated, settling in his gut every time they meet, and he pretends it’s something else, something simple.  Admiration is less complicated.  Whatever this is, it makes him wanna clear his throat about a dozen times and salute until his arm falls off. He even gets the urge to get down and shine his shoes, knowing the man would hate it and wanting to do it anyway.  Sam, Teal’c, and Daniel had become his friends; it was the general, _this_ general he’s never gotten used to. 

He’s sure it’s constantly written all over his face and that’s why, today, he can hardly look at him.

His inner voice, sounding terrifyingly like his grandmother, is berating him at high volume.  <i>The man isn’t even properly in uniform</i>, she scolds as if that’s the only problem with the dizzy hyperawareness that’s made Cam waver on his feet.  He’s fine now and he says as much.  The team and the generals are gathered around him, a collective of frowns that would make the ladies’ auxiliary, decked in their Sunday best, chatter busily in condemnation tinged with respect. <i>All they need is a couple of paper fans and they’re in business.</i> 

It’s an image that would make him smile if the general at the heart of his spell wasn’t standing right beside him.  His hand’s resting heavily on Cam’s shoulder and it’s enough to sway him towards the older man the way an open flame leans toward pure O2.  He’s burning up all right and like hell he’ll give his grandma’s voice time to comment on that.  He jumps up quick and steps out of General O’Neill’s immediate vicinity to round the conference table.  He’s just fine and feeling fine and it’s not too hot in here. No, he doesn’t need water; he just needs this meeting to end.  It’s exhausting.

“Just a little tired,” he rationalizes. “Didn’t sleep much,” he adds once he realizes he’s said that last bit out loud.  He’s starting to wish he’d just fainted, ah, passed out in the first place. It would have been easier than facing their faces and their concern, especially his.  O’Neill’s taken to stuffing his hands in the pockets of his khakis and he’s letting his leather jacket hang open and loose off his shoulders.  He’s giving Cam a look he wouldn’t call anything other than piercing and Cam’s doing his level best not to turn tail and run.

“Cameron Mitchell, is something wrong?” It’s Teal’c and a relief.  Were this any other place, Cam might lay his head on the big man’s shoulder. As it is, it’s just one more thing he can’t do.

“T-Man, me? Nah, nothing’s wrong. I’m just—I didn’t eat.”  Teal’c looks him over dubiously and he backtracks like mad.  “I mean, breakfast obviously didn’t agree with me,” and before he knows it, he’s shooting off at the mouth like it’s going out of style and he’s got a prime collection of BS to push.  He doesn’t know how much more of this he can stand, because there is no good reason; all he’s got are bad ones and he just wants to do this meeting over.  He’d like to do this whole life decision over, starting with the moment Jack O’Neill sauntered into his life and gave him a peculiar affinity for silver-haired men in Class A’s.

Apparently, it’s progressed and civvies will do.  Cam doesn’t need this, doesn’t need a little thrill every time his CO’s CO is in town.  He doesn’t need another want layered on top of all the others he can’t acknowledge.  He doesn’t need this epiphany hitting him over the head with the force of a naquadriah-enhanced warhead on a day that started damned good and that’s ended up here.  He doesn’t need this, but here it is.

“Mitchell!” The <i>shut the hell up</i> goes unspoken, a near thing, and Cam’s saying amen for the smallest of favors today.

“Yes, sir.”  He stiffens to strict attention and waits for the axe that O’Neill can wield so well to fall.

“Walk with me,” the man commands and Mitchell obeys without a backwards glance.  If the briefing room breaks out into whispered chatter upon their exit, the general doesn’t notice or doesn’t care.  While Cam does both, this isn’t his show and this is not his call.  He follows like a good little airman till they reach the lift and it takes them to Level 31, purposed for little and populated by few.  The general still doesn’t say a word and Cam keeps to his heels, wondering if this is where the unhinged and unwanted go to vanish around here.

The silence creeps into his ears, building pressure and creating sounds all its own.  By the time they reach their destination, he feels like he’s under water.  General O’Neill opens an unlocked door and nods for Cam to go in first.  He is suspicious as hell, but orders are rarely requests, so in he goes.  The door closes behind him and he wonders if this is it. He wonders if this is how his career goes, this is how he ends, this is his last great adventure--

He wonders who’s got him by the shoulders and how he ended up caught between the concrete wall and a hard place; or rather, hard planes.  He wonders why he’s spent the last two minutes with his eyes closed, but he knows why.  He can’t see his hero as the bad guy, doesn’t want to.  That’s the extent of his yeller streak and it’s getting stronger.

“Feel free to open your eyes anytime now.”

He cracks one. “Sir?”

The general’s braced over him, a hand on each side, with an expression of infinite patience on his face.  It’s almost enough to make Cam declare a foothold situation; it’s not exactly a trait the man’s known for.

“You done playing Peek-a-boo?”

Cam gulps. “Yes, sir.”

“Good,” the general says before his patience transforms into something predatory and Cam’s fear of being trapped turns into a hot, dry inhale where there isn’t enough air. His legs are about to come from under him, but the general’s got things well in hand—him well in hand. Fingers slide back into his hair as the man leans down to kiss him. Makes him confused, disoriented, happy in a way that hurts.

And yet, he kisses back.  He groans in welcome to the tongue that flicks his palate only to tease at his own tongue.  He takes the battle back to it, making the general hum in evident approval before he reasserts control.  They’re flush together, hips compressed in the narrow space not occupied by defunct lab equipment.

And he’s absolutely not about to admit that he wants to get on his knees for this man. That half of his fantasies involve making the man, THE MAN, incoherent with his mouth and the other half is split between his fingers and his dick. Not admitting that.

Also not admitting the kinkier aspect of his personality that wants his general to come on him, right on his chest.   _Now, now, now._ It’s just not happening, but he wants it and he can admit that to himself.

They pull apart and he’s breathless; dizzy again, wants more. He isn’t asking where this came from, because it’s always been there; he’s been waiting for this.

“Why, sir?”  _Sir, sir, sir_ , _stupid word_ , he thinks; he just doesn’t know anything else that’s safe.  He feels like Sam must have, with peril hinging on a dysfunctional security camera and desire warring with what he knows to be right.  And he can’t think of all the ways this might hurt her, not when they look at the man the same way and want him the same, even if they’ve never said the words.

“Because,” the general murmurs as he slides off his jacket and starts on his shirt, “you kept looking at me like you were terrified of me.”  Cam is definitely not afraid to see him like this.  It’s hard to fight the urge to touch when the general turns his back. Scars and tanned skin, muscles that visibly pull and stretch.  He licks his lips and tries to listen.

When he can think again, Cam feels confused, not necessarily a new feeling since he’s taken over SG-1, but not one he likes either.  “I-“

“I knew you weren’t afraid of me, Mitchell. Everyone knows that. But I’ve seen that face before on subordinates and it’s usually followed by one of two things: an ill-advised attempt at seduction or a request for a transfer.  You weren’t in a position to attempt either, so I took the matter out of your hands.”  He doesn’t even look smug, just resolved and certain. Cam wishes he felt so steady.  He’s afraid to even reach for his own buttons, despite the fact that they burn at his skin. He feels to covered, too clothed; to untouchable compared to all the touching he wants to do.

“Do this much, General?”  And it’s as stupid a thing to say as it sounds.  He could pretty much kill himself for it.

General O’Neill turns slowly to look him in the eye.  Cam doesn’t flinch even as he regrets that glib remark. It won’t do him any good to show fear now.

Instead he ends up back against the concrete wall, hissing at the shock of how cold it can be against skin that’s still running too hot.  He can’t complain about it for long, as he’s arched away from it into the hand that’s stroking his dick to attention through his BDUs.  The general slips the zipper down and his hand inside and it gets even harder to complain.

“Fuck,” he whimpers and he feels like a damned fool whimpering in front of a three-star, even one working him with just the right pressure, just the right twist of the wrist near the head.  He doesn’t have a lot of pride left, but what he’d give for some sheets to cling to; he could put it off then, bask in this pleasure for a long, slow ride.  He wants that so bad he has to blink away the saltwater in his eyes.

 _Fuck this. I am_ not _about to cry over a hand job._ Not even one that feels this good.  He gives up resisting and lets his hips jerk along with every practiced stroke.  His knees are shaking and the general isn’t holding him up this time.  _He’s punishing me_. He knows it the way he knows not to reach for him in his polo and his khakis.  This man doesn’t belong to him, but he’d given him access for one occasion and Cam had definitely fucked it up.

“Sorry, sorry,” he finds himself mumbling as the strokes come faster and he’s being pushed up toward that peak faster and he knows he’s close, can feel it working up to the surface from deep inside him.  He wants more and he can’t ask for it, craves it and doesn’t deserve it, needs it and is willing to beg. God, if he could make his lips obey, he would beg.

Suddenly, the general spins him toward the wall like he’s about to make an arrest and Cam’s left confused and lost and then that hand returns and its companion dances between his thighs to cup his balls and Cam _knows_ he’s about to lose control of his volume. Caress, squeeze, roll in time to the tightening of that fist on his dick and, with this eyes closed, Cam’s mind makes up a tight fuck with brown eyes and a laid-back idea of top, bottom, and versatile.  He doesn’t have to work hard to give that fuck a name and he’s whimpering again, “Fuck, please.” It’s almost funny.

“That’s ‘Fuck, please, sir,’ Mitchell, and don’t you forget it.”

“Sir, no, sir. Fuck, sir, please, sir.”

“You want it, Colonel?”

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

“Yes, sir, General, sir.  So close, so close, sir.”  He’s gasping, wondering how long he can hover this close before he loses it. “Need it, sir, need it.”

He’s been so distracted with the first hand— _so good, so fucking good_ —that he hasn’t paid any attention to the other one getting him ready with lube from who the hell cares where.  It’s a good thing, because he thinks he might go bonzo it if he had to wait anymore.  Before he knows it, he’s being spread and _yes, yes, yes_ , _fuck_ , tip, cock pushing inside him slow and steady while he tries to breathe and his own dick weeps.  He could finish himself, reach down and-The general’s  got his hands trapped against  the wall and he’s taking him from behind, arcing his hips just right after a few false starts, leaving Cam no doubt that the good general is hardly a first time offender of this particular rule.  Cam could give a damn who or where or when.  He just wants harder and deeper and the words aren’t coming.  Just, “God, please, sir,” and he knows he’ll never say ‘sir’ the same way again.

~!~

 

**Vala**

                There is something that you simply must understand about Vala Mal Doran.  She is a loyal girl, it is true, but her first loyalty is to herself and her desires.  That has often meant that she and the few women she has ever called friends have often found themselves, shall we say, at loggerheads.  She takes accountability for her actions, but it isn’t her fault that their men won’t take accountability for theirs.  Vala likes what she likes and wants who she wants.  Life can be ever so short in one’s own hands or it can be far too long in the hands of another.  She rather intends to enjoy her short life.

                Still, momentary guilt seizes her seconds before she dips her spoon into Jack O’Neill’s jell-o.  The bright red stuff jiggles as if in anticipation at her proximity, making her smile at the distorted reflection she can see of herself.  It’s how she’s always seen herself anyway and, for a second, who she appears to be and who she feels like sync.  There aren’t many moments like that and each ones bears celebrating.

                She scoops up a poor deformed cube and a half and pops them into her mouth.  The taste is like nothing in the galaxy and covered in whipped cream, it’s even better to the tongue.  She rather prefers other colors and flavors, but the company will suffice to cover her balance of pleasure.  With a leisurely, eerily audible pop, she pulls her spotless spoon out of her mouth and asks for another.

                He smiles at her and tells her, “Help yourself.”  And suddenly, he’s standing and the dessert cup is right in front of her and he’s leaving—she feels like she’s missed some part of the script, missed her line and the story’s moved on. But his passing hand rubs lines into her shoulder as deliberately as pen strokes.  The room number of the most deserted guest quarters on base is cherry-flavored at her last swallow.  It’s all the better, really; she intends to mark every last inch of her quarry in crimson question marks and curiosities and she can’t do that here even at this hour.

                She wonders if Samantha will forgive her or if her general will be the first one she shuns.  She isn’t completely sure that hers is a friendship she can bear to lose.

                “There’s nothing…there,” he explains once he’s lying in the dark beside her. The desk lamp is on and it’s enough to chase away Ba’al’s shadows. What it fails to achieve, they do for each other.  Their comparison of scars is made without bravado. Her body is by far the more flawless even if neither show the damage.  The sarcophagus does not merely destroy the soul by ripping it from the afterlife; it destroys the soul by rendering mortal wounds ephemeral, thereby starving the spirit of closure.  She envies him the ragged, silken blights that traverse his body from other battles lost and won.  She wishes she at least had those.

                There is no comfort in perfection, not when abomination is what it hides.

                When he sleeps, he keeps his demons locked down tight behind titanium defenses.  Other men toss in the throes of nightmares; he makes fists and holds tight to the nearest safe harbor.  Vala has no idea how she’s become that to a man she hardly knows beyond stories, but she is.  She touches back where his hands meet around her waist and accepts the almost crushing pressure of being his touchstone.  She hardly sleeps at night and has no use for comfort; it’s nothing to let him have what she can’t.

                He tucks his nose into the curve of her neck, mumbling in a language that might be Goa’uld, Ancient, or some bastardization of the two.  His demons live in both worlds and hers inhabit even more.  She doesn’t mind being crushed in the arms of a man who’ll let go tomorrow.  In fact, what she might have a problem with is the letting go.

                And to dear Samantha, lovely Daniel, Muscles, and Cam, she will be ever so sorry if they ever know. But not right now and not tonight. Maybe, just maybe in the morning.


	14. SG-1: Time Immemorial

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They had fallen in and out of love in a single day—and none of the rest would ever know.
> 
> Written for the comment_fic prompt, SG1, Jack O'Neill/Vala Mal Doran, secrets. Approx 1500 words.

                How could Vala explain to one of her only friends that she’d fallen for the man she clearly, if secretly, loved?  How could she explain to the man she had come to adore that she’d fallen in love with his best friend?

                The truth was that she couldn’t.  They wouldn’t understand. In their eyes, Vala had met General Jack O’Neill a handful of days ago and it had been an unimpressive introduction to say the least.  That she felt differently now would astound them, and that was the last thing Vala wanted her friends to be.

                The time loop had struck viciously, reintroducing her to the man time and again, and leaving her with the dissatisfying distinction of this stranger as her only ally.  She couldn’t explain why it was that only the two of them seemed to realize that time was refusing to pass.  It was the same damned day and damnable hours on repeat.  In the beginning, most of that was wasted trying to make the others understand that, no, this was not a prank and, no, they didn’t need CT scans.

                One can be safe in assuming the latter pursuit was an abject failure.  She’d successfully taught herself how to nap through the tests by the time the general had shown up to drag her out of the imaging laboratory.

                “That’s enough of that,” he’d said and pulled her to the commissary, where they’d proceeded to gorge themselves on all and sundry sweets.  She could have argued, but the idea that there’d be no tomorrow was depressing enough and it was unlikely any of it was going to have a chance to go her hips anyway.  So, she ate like a voracious demon and took a nap.  It was the first time she had something better to do than follow Daniel or Sam to their respective labs and pester them about the incredible bother intrinsic to traveling through time.

                This didn’t stop her from being surprised when she roused on her feet, twenty-three hours back in time.  SG-1’s former commanding officer was standing directly before her, a faint smirk tipping his lips.  He’d offered her his hand for the umpteenth occasion and said hello.  She’d said likewise and asked if he’d like to go paintball shooting.  He’d quirked an inquisitive eyebrow and agreed. They’d left the rest of the team in their proverbial dust.

                While slipping onto the SGC training grounds, she’d explained how Teal’c had been kind enough to introduce her to the Tau’ri pastime and how she’d come to love it. It was simulated violence without the guilt, something she could use a lot less of in her life.  He’d immediately understood.

                He’d shed his uniform with practiced ease and donned a set of borrowed BDUs to take up arms against her.  They were evenly matched.  She never would have imagined that her years in a galaxy far, far away would have prepared her to go head to head with one of the Tau’ri’s most formidable warriors on his own ground. It was thrilling.

                It was humbling.

                It was quite hot actually.

                She took him down as frequently as he took her, hooking her legs around his aging knees with an agility he clearly recalled but could not emulate.  He netted her with exceptional stealth, entrapping her in snares of her own making.  For all he might have been renowned for his lack of intellectual prowess, she found those claims faltering on the simulated battlefield.  He knew himself well and his opponent even better.  She’d have gladly pinned another pair of stars on his shoulders for the effort.

                As it was, he took it upon himself to pin her.  Not the first time, of course, there were was a crisis of the space-time continuum to resolve at that point. By the sixth time they’d circuited the proving ground in as many loops, they’d grown bored of it.  Re-designing the obstacles and foxholes took time and left them too exhausted to play so they found new places.

                The hiking path behind his home was ideal.  _Pity for the other patrons_ , she thought somewhat contritely—before she took a well-aimed shot at the head of silver hair just over the nearest rise.  It ducked in time and she swore, sulking.  If he was going to use _all_ his training when it came to stealth capability, she was going to be in a bit of a spot.

                Who was she kidding? She was already in a bit of spot. The trouble was she was beginning to enjoy it.

                They’d had to sneak out of Cheyenne to come here and there was no doubt that the assembled might of SG-1 and the Security Forces of Stargate Command was about to descend on their dizzy heads before the hour was through.  It was true and inevitable and she didn’t care.

                _They’re perfectly welcome to make a picnic of it, bring chairs and cake!_   Her imagination began to run wild with dessert-filled speculation and she was positively oblivious to their war game now.   She dropped down to sit at the base of a gnarled tree in order to focus more intently on the merits of chocolate versus chocolate/yellow swirl.  After coming to a decision, she was immediately set upon by another crucial question, _But icing, which icing shall it have?_

                Vala hadn’t been a particular fan of either cake or Jell-O until the general had involved himself in her dessert tastes. She now spent a fair deal of time wondering what she’d be eating next.  It was certainly one way to pass the unpassing time.

                She draped her arms across her paint rifle and daydreamed about a bakery.  _Maybe next loop he can take me somewhere with muffins. That would be lovely._   Decided, Vala lifted her weapon, pointed 35° to her left and fired.

                He yelped.

                She grinned.

                The bright blue splotch of paint on his neck had given him away.  _Someone’s out of practice.  I suppose it’s time for a refresher course._   While he was recovering his dignity, she shot up and ran for her life.  It only took him thirteen seconds to start after her, but that was all the time she needed.

                She leapt over a hedge and hot-footed into his backyard.  He could be heard grousing over the rapidly-closing distance.  His blown knees did nothing to deter him in his pursuit.

                Vala paused, turned back, and beamed. Then, she shut his backdoor in his face and made faces at him through the window.  If looks had the power to be deadly, she would have perished where she stood.  As it was, her heart nearly stuttered to a halt when he held up one lithe-fingered hand and waved a very familiar…key in front of her.

                The smile he wore at that moment was dangerous, not so different from the one Ba’al had sported during a number of their trysts in her time as host to Qetesh.  Many decades had passed since it had frightened her; she still turned tail and ran.

                Luck—or something—had given her phenomenal timing. She’d landed in Teal’c’s massive embrace just as the general would have caught up with her outside his front door. She scrambled down and ducked behind him, peeking around the Jaffa’s waist with a notably smug affect.

                “You can’t get me,” she mouthed triumphantly.

                “Not yet,” he glowered.  Afterwards, he’d turned to his guests with guns and camo and asked what all the fuss was about.

                Suffice to say no one was pleased with their daring escape capabilities.  The two found themselves relegated to one of the base’s observation lounge for the duration of the evening.  There was napping, paper hockey, and a very long and protracted _Simpsons_ marathon.  Vala simply chose to nap more during the latter occasion.  Vala thought General O’Neill made a fair pillow and he seemed to consider her lap quite the serving tray.  Without allowing herself to become too amused about the unintended implications of that observation, she curled up even closer and fell asleep on his shoulder.

                She woke up on her feet again.  This time, however, it was only the general, leading her to the folding cot in the room to get a proper rest.  He did the entire ritual; helping her out of her boots, relieving her of her jacket, and tucking her in.  She thought it was rather sweet.  He’d groused when she groggily asserted the fact, but she made nothing of it and slept like the dead.  It was much easier to feel safe with a veteran Special Ops officer guarding your bed.  The very idea of it gave her such funny dreams that the next time they looped, instead of meeting his eyes, she looked the other way.

                Vala Mal Doran did not need bodyguards or knights, she was perfectly content safeguarding herself.  Nevertheless, she couldn’t deny thinking it interesting that someone wanted to try, especially someone who hardly knew her. Jack O’Neill was an odd man, but she had quickly come to the conclusion that she liked him.  And, evidently, he liked her as well.

                She supposed in some small way that meant their situation was looking up.


	15. SG-1: The Match Made (an everybody's a scientist AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cassie and Charlie O’Neill just want their dad to be happy and, since their mom’s death, he hasn’t been. They think Sam Carter’s the woman to change that. Jack seriously disagrees. Sam only hopes she can prove to him that while she may not be Janet (or Sara), she can be good for him, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Approx 2200 words. Friends to lovers, implied character death, Jack's a retired soldier turned weapons engineer. Sara & Jack adopted Cassie together before she was killed in an auto accident.

                Jack was striding down the halls of the Quantum Mirror Project so quickly hardly anyone noticed the limp that had plagued him for years.  When he got like this, his training kicked in and the nagging pain kicked out.  He was a man accomplished and determined the share the wealth of information.  Dr. Jack O’Neill was on fire and in search of his partner in scientific progress.

                He rounded the corner of level 13 toward the corridor where the auxiliary labs of the Quantum Mirror Project were situated.  He knew for a fact that Major Sam Carter had hunkered down here for the night to perform a number of less than authorized experiments on the recently discovered naquadah variant, naquadrium. 

It was sort of their standing arrangement that she could utilize their unoccupied lab space to do lab work off the clock in exchange for letting him borrow some of the more costly SGC equipment to test his alter-reality findings.  It had worked for them for the bulk of the last three years and had aided their working relationship the few occasions when they’d been assigned to work on projects spanning both programs.

                Today, he wanted to show her the fruits of some of their hardest work.  He was positively dancing inside his skin. He knew she’d immediately understand the implications of what he’d managed to do, perhaps more than anyone else working in their respective commands. This. Was. Big.

                He doubted she’d realize exactly how much time he’d devoted to this one because he’d been so certain it would pan out. Amid his daily responsibilities of heading of the QMP’s engineering department and acting as the de facto head of the whole enchilada, he didn’t have a ton of extra lab time to himself.  Generally, he took the lead on backwards-engineering the vital weaponry and non-armament discoveries and left the more mundane work to his colleagues and lab assistants.  But this, like the QMP itself, had been his brainchild and accessible to no one but him—and her, though she’d seen little in the way of practical application potential at the time.

                Jack had always admired Sam Carter (for her bravery in the field back when he’d fought alongside her, for her prowess in a laboratory setting where he observed her, and even for her beauty), but sometimes he seriously believed that she lacked imagination.

                He all but skidded to a stop outside her lab space and gave a knock to the heavy, titanium, reinforced steel blast door.  The knock felt—and sounded—woefully inadequate to the task of alerting her to his presence and he, not for the first time, considered requesting installation of door bells throughout his domain. He didn’t care if the bureaucrats thought it was ridiculous, Jack thought _this_ was ridiculous. He had news—big news—and he was ostensibly tapping a bank vault with a pencil. See? Ridiculous.

                “Yo, Carter!”  He heard exactly nothing through the three-inch thick bulkhead.  “Welp,” he muttered to himself, rubbing the back of his neck. He had a number of options. He could call her cell, which she might have brought down with her. Seemed like it would have been a good idea if he’d actually brought down _his_ cell phone.  He could have her paged, but that would require him finding someone to do all the paging and he really wasn’t in the mood for all the walking that’d require. He could also wait, which he hated under any and all circumstances.

                Jack cursed and leaned back against the adjacent wall to do just that. He really didn’t want to run in there and have something volatile blow up in his face, but…he was really, really excited.  _She’d understand, right?_ Maybe. He didn’t really want to find out the hard way that she wouldn’t.

                “Damn it, Carter. You need a damned ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign or ‘Come Right In’ light for this place as much time as you spend here.”  With one last glower at the stubbornly closed door, he crossed his arms and closed his eyes.  He passed a satisfying couple of seconds grumbling about the state of things and blonde command-track science officers hogging his lab space.

                “Hasn’t anybody ever told you that patience is a virtue,” asked an amused voice out of the lab in front of him.  He managed the great feat of rolling his eyes while they were closed. It hurt a lot more than he was expecting.

                “And, science waits for no one.”  Silence descended as Jack decided that she could wait.  He was pretty much over his Nobel Prize-worthy accomplishment at this point. _Maybe._

                “I thought that was time.”

                “That either.” He cracked his lids and saw her put her hands on her hips intolerantly.  _Somebody’s pissed_ , he decided.

                “So, you wanted me?”

                Jack resisted the impulse to waggle his eyebrows suggestively, answering, “Yeahsureyabetcha. Get out here.”  She didn’t.  He threw up his hands.  “Please, Carter, come see what awesome breakthrough I’ve had with the BioStas.”

                Now, he had her attention and he knew it.  She ambled right out into the corridor with her goggles still dangling from around her neck.

                “What’ve you got?”

                “I’ve got a working prototype.”

                “And what can it do?”

                At this, Jack looked particularly smug.  “What do you think it can do?”

                “I was hoping it worked as body armor. Does it do that?”

                “Oh, yeah, it does.”  He wasn’t hiding his victorious mood well.

                “Against what?”  Jack liked that wide-eyed disbelief she was sporting probably a lot more than he should have. _Down boy._ Shaking his head, he began to tick off the capabilities of his lovely invention.

                “Let’s see…zat blasts, staff weapon fire. Ah, and we can’t forget entropic cascade failure.”

                “I’m sorry, I thought you said that the BioStas suddenly protects against ECF. Am I going deaf?”

                “Nope.”  He tipped his head. “Well, maybe, but not because of what I just said.  It negates the effects of ECF—with aplomb if I do say so myself.”

                “If I kiss you, do you promise not to report me for sexual harassment?”  For a second, Jack thought she was serious, and he was seriously considering letting her do just that.  “Don’t answer that, because I’m not doing it.”

                He muttered and kicked a foot at the cement floor, “Tease.”

                “Pot, kettle. Howdy,” she smirked and sent him a sarcastic little wave.  Jack glared at her for stealing his sarcasm. He didn’t appreciate that, even if he did deserve it. He was the one who’d put the brakes on any sort of romance between them. No sense in him getting bent out of shape about it now.

                He rolled his eyes. Now was not the time to deal with their quasi-romantic crisis. “Okay, yeah, whatever.  The important thing here is we’ve got a breakthrough and I need to put the rig through its paces before I can even think of telling any of the big heads upstairs.”

                Despite momentarily balking at his obvious dismissal of their issues, Carter moved from unimpressed to confused in a hurry.  “If you weren’t sure, why are you telling me?”

                Jack threw up his hands. “Because you’re Carter!” he yelled like it made perfect sense. If her expression was anything to go by, it didn’t.  “You’re the only person who even knows I’ve been working on this, much less how close it is to being done.”  He combed his fingers through his hair both in embarrassment and frustration. He hated this.  “You get what this is like.  I didn’t know who else to tell.”

                With a peek out of the corner of his eye, Jack spied the beginnings of a Carter smile at her lips.  He really would have liked to sulk, but she always looked so damn cute when she smiled that he knew he wasn’t going to get anywhere with that.  _See, this is a problem._

                “So, you’ve really worked it out?”  He was a little—what? Touched, abashed, elated—at the wonder in her voice.  She just got this like no one did.  Who was he kidding? He was dabbling in her end of the pool. She was the inventor, he was just the guy that made stuff keep working that already worked to begin with, just in a different way.  This was his first time—mostly—wholesale inventing something new.  It was like graduating or getting promoted to the major leagues.

                “Yeah, I did.”  It suddenly seemed very real to him and he was at a loss of what to do next.

                “Congratulations, Jack.”  The next thing he knew, he had a couple of arms filled with Air Force major and so much less regret.  He held her close for a moment, basking in the warmth that came with just being near another person like this after so long in isolation.  _More choices I made_ , he thought, momentarily exhausted as he reflected on the last year and the many years before.

                “Thanks, Sam.” In passing, he kissed her cheek and pulled away.  Her fingers lingered on his arm and he pretended not to notice.

                “As the saying goes, ‘Ya done good,’ Jack.”

                He smirked. “Why, thank you.”  He took a bow, his grin widening.  “I couldn’t have done it without the invaluable assistance of my invaluable colleague, Major Samantha Carter.”

                She tipped her head and peered at him with what he hoped was fondness.  “You know you’re not required to give me credit for anything.”

                He shrugged like it made all the sense in the world.  “It was your methodological foundation, I just built on it.  This is, by all rights, a joint work, if not yours outright.”

                “You’re selling yourself short again. What am I always telling you about that?”  He kicked the floor again, contrite but unwilling to show it. “You’re a great weapons engineer, Jack, one of the best.  If you weren’t any good, you wouldn’t have nearly the responsibility you have. Chances are you wouldn’t even be in the program.  I’m not convinced there’d even be a program.”

                “Don’t start that again.  You designed the dialing program as well as the stellar drift model. As long as there’s a you, there’s a this,” he gestured to the bunker all around them and everything it signified.

                “Be careful, Jack. I might start to think you appreciate me.”

                He tilted his head slightly to look at her from a different perspective.  It bothered him that she always seemed to believe that he didn’t care about her at all.  He knew he’d never been the overly-affectionate type, but he liked to think in the short time she’d been under his command that he’d shown her even a fraction of the pride he felt as he watched her grow into the fine officer she’d become.  _Guess not_ , he thought, disappointed in himself not for the first time.

                He suppressed a sigh, but it was a near thing.  Smiling thinly in response to her curious look, he decided to quickly extract himself from this situation before it got any more awkward. _Oh, hey, look at that. More proof that we’re a bad idea._   He didn’t feel nearly as triumphant as he had before.  Going head to head with her had always done that to him.

                “So, yeah, I just wanted to let you how things were shaking out.” He took a couple of half steps away, needing distance to clear his head. “I’ll let you get back to your work and I’ll get back to mine.”  His jaw was killing him. Fake smiles tended to set his teeth to grinding and he’d never ground quite so hard before.  “See ya, Carter.”  In a parody of good humor, he waved and made to get away from his partner in conflict.  It was starting to bring him down and he just didn’t have time for that today.

                With enough effort, he could pretend he didn’t feel those blue eyes boring into the back of his head like so many Lasik beams.  She could read him like cue cards and he knew what was written all over his face.  He couldn’t bear to see what was written on hers.

Things would probably never be bad between them professionally, but, personally, he doubted they’d ever be good.  He regretted that more than she would ever know, which was saying something since Samantha Carter knew everything.

She just couldn’t know this.

~!~

                Jack stood at the summit of Cheyenne Mountain and enjoyed the view.  It was breathtaking at this height, regardless of the intrusion of the technology of man; of the road trailing down the center, of the tunnel running through and the barbed wire fences that bisected its face.  It was a beautiful place that hid less than beautiful secrets.  He’d built some of these secrets and guarded all of them.  He loved his work, but there were days when it couldn’t have felt more wrong.


	16. SG-1: Land of Blue Skies & Clinched Fists (Time Travel AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AU. Robert Kinsey’s just discovered there’s a price on his head—for something he hasn’t done yet. | Colonel Samantha Carter never imagined herself as an avenging angel, but for the husband and sons she’ll put in the ground six years from now, she can be anything. The past won't know what hit it. | Jack O'Neill had always thought they were stronger than this. Reality is a cruel wake-up call.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PG-13 rated, implied character death, semi-graphic reference to child death, time travel, Sam-centric, approx 3700 words

                In fourteen years with the SGC, Sam Carter had learned a lot about appearing cool, calm, and collected when she needed to. Today, she really needed to.

                She raised her hands above her head and waited for the stunned personnel in the control room to make their way down to the gateroom.  The security team wasn’t playing around; their guns hadn’t left her person since she’d stepped through the gate. Not that she could blame them, she had overridden the iris controls after all. 

_Whoops_ , she smiled to herself.  No regrets.

“Well, this is a cliché,” Jack quipped on the group’s behalf once they’d arrived at the foot of the ramp.

“It is getting a little old, isn’t it,” Sam answered in kind.  She was used to picking up the sarcasm ball where he dropped it.  She’d missed that.

He paused to look her over before signaling one of the SF’s to search her.  She sighed but submitted, supposing she ought to get used to these kinds of inconveniences.

“So…who are you?”

Resting her hands on the back of her head for want of something else to do with them, she replied, “Who do I look like?”

His eyes never left hers and she was quietly grateful. There was a certain inexplicable sanity in looking into Jack O’Neill’s eyes.  She couldn’t have explained it despite the fact it was the only thing keeping her going.  Explaining the way he made her feel had never been a strong suit of hers.

“We’ve already got one of you, so, _who_ are _you_?”

“Occam’s Razor: the simplest answer is generally the correct one.”

“Actually,” Daniel rushed to emend, “it states that—“

“Daniel,” Sam warned while Jack groaned, “let’s assume we all get the gist of it and move on.”

His mouth clicked shut, leaving Sam feeling both guilty and grateful.  There’d been a time when she loved to watch him go.  It had been a long time since then.

“She makes sense, sir. Let’s keep her.”  Jack withstood the team’s glaring with good-natured obliviousness.  _He can still put on a show like no ten circus performers I’ve ever seen_ , she thought, and missed him all the more.

“Not so fast, Colonel. I’d still like to know just how we found ourselves with two Major Carters instead of one.”  With that, he’d chucked the ball firmly back in Sam’s court – and she hadn’t even had a chance to put her hands down yet.

“Well, sir, it’s pretty simple.”  The SF gave the all-clear and Sam dropped her arms back to her sides.  _All right then._

“Is that so, Major?”

 She blinked at being misaddressed by rank. “Colonel, sir. It’s colonel. And the answer I think you’re looking for is time travel.  My name is Colonel Samantha Carter, General, and I’m from the future.”

Jack grunted, “Still a cliché.”

She had to admit, the man had a point.

**~!~**

**~!~**

Sam woke up in the dark.  She ignored the pain in her throbbing head to assess the situation at hand.  She knew where she was, she just didn’t know when.  It was becoming a routine emotion.

                _You intercept a solar flare, you never know when it’ll take you._   She could admit to herself that the machine was far from her best work.  Built on adrenalin and desperation, it couldn’t have been, but here she was anyway.  The weight of the mountain pressed down on her familiarly; the sheets beneath her smelled stale as an abandoned garden.  _Same old, same old._   Here she was walking in her own footsteps all over again.  She’d never wanted to do that.   As usual, life had taken one look at her plans and thrown in the nearest wrench.

                She’d had everything she ever wanted a month ago – she didn’t have that now.

**…**

_Samantha Carter didn’t have time to build a time machine.  She’d never needed one, not to save a life or change the past.  Sam had never hated life enough to want to do it over.  Not until Sunday when they left her, when she found them – what was left of them._

_Mikey O’Neill had bright blue eyes like Sam.  They looked right through her from their resting place on the front step.  They lay there on their own outside of the face she loved them in, a smear of congealed blood telling a story that made her sick and left her blood boiling._

_Her heart beat loudly in her ears and she slammed the door shut at the sight.  She couldn’t take a breath, but she couldn’t be still either.  Tears were already stinging her eyes when she got her hands on her gun.  She wanted to yell for Jack, for backup, for her team, all of which was lost to her.  She was on her own and the feeling of her heart crawling up her throat left her choked.  Suddenly, her own home had become a deathtrap, her own personal warzone._

_The death toll was already one._

**_…_ **

She woke up with the sheets clutched in her fists. In her mind’s eye, it was her son’s hand.  Cold and still and broken; still, she couldn’t let go.  That used to be the best thing about her.

She reached for the lamp and her nightmare receded into the shadows, though it lingered on the margins of her mind.  Sleep was over, she could breathe for a while.

The base guest quarters had never been much of comfort, but they were today.  She remembered Samantha Carter-O’Neill and her broken heart.  Sam wished she could meet her now and ask her how she’d survived.  Whatever it was she was doing, Sam wouldn’t call this living.

**…**

**~!~**

 [Sam meets up with present!SG-1 again and tells them the deal. She meets Kinsey again]

                Sam stood shoulder to shoulder with her younger self and her younger team.  It was awkward, to say the least.

                “This is…weird,” Jack remarked unnecessarily.

                “Yup,” she agreed.  She felt strange without her weapon, which was strange in and of itself.  She hadn’t brought one with her, knowing she’d be relieved of it immediately, but right now she wanted one on hand. Right now, she wanted something forceful to stand between her and the ghosts of a lifetime passed.  They were all alive and she could hardly believe it though she knew it was true.  She hadn’t been able to tell Janet why she’d nearly crushed her to death in a hug, but the woman had always been bright; she’d known.

                Sam found herself doing the comforting, then, for both of them.  “You have years, make them the best ones.”  It was her turn to be crushed in a hug so tight she felt the very fabric of time twist in its hold.   She was in the business of changing history anyway, she may as well do it for the better.

                “So, you’re here why exactly?”  He was still eyeing her with a mix of trepidation and casual acceptance.  She was his Carter, but she wasn’t at the same time.  Sam grinned at the thought; Jack had never been a fan of time travel.

                She shrugged. “To fix things.” 

                “Anything in particular?”

                Sam couldn’t answer that…

~!~

[Jacob arrives and something prompts him to question Sam’s relationship with Jack. Sam proclaims innocence in the future, but snaps when she discusses the downturn of her career.]

                “Most of the time, I’m fine,” she started softly.  “Most of the time, I see him and it’s nothing. He’s just him and I’m just some person he sort of knows. But when we were in the control room…” She shrugged, unable to express the feeling in words anyone would understand.  “He said my name and I knew, I _knew_ he meant me.  He asked _me_ , not the Carter he knew, but me for intel as though he trusted that the first thing I’d tell him would be the truth.”

                Her father cradled her shoulders in his hands.  She wanted to crawl into his arms and cry.  She wouldn’t, though, hadn’t since her mother died.  She wasn’t that little girl anymore.

                “Didn’t your Jack trust you?”

                She sniffled and smiled. “More than anything. He used to tell me he’d trust me if I told him the sky was yellow.”

                “Knowing you, you’d find a way to turn it yellow just so you could be right.”

                Sam chuckled past the ache in her throat.  “I’d have turned it purple if he wanted it to be.”

                “Sweetheart, you’d hold your breath until _you_ turned purple if Jack O’Neill asked you to.”  She stared down the mountain’s slope without saying a word, but she’d never needed to.  “But I already know that.”  He kissed the back of her head and slipped away.  “He isn’t gone yet, Sam, talk to him,” trailed off in his wake. A widower to a widow, who better to know?

                Minutes passed while she stood there paralyzed with uncertainty.  The past she’d come to change was in front of her, yet here she stood as distant from it as she could be without going sliding down the mountain face.

                Jack O’Neill’s presence made itself known before he spoke.  It always had to her. He lingered in the doorway, quiet save for the minute creaking of his combat boots as he shifted his weight.  She felt him reading her body language, sussing out secrets she’d decided to keep and failed, deciding if this was his place at all.  For a man who claimed to think so little, he thought far too much where she was concerned.

                “You’re letting the heat out of the mountain, maybe you should close the door.”  He could come or go, either was fine; that’s what she wanted to say, but the words weren’t there. 

_Please, stay._   Years of marriage, over a decade in love and she’d still never learned to be quite this vulnerable in front of him.

“I just wanted to come out here and make sure everything’s okay. Is it?”  She sent him a wan look. He frowned and took a step closer.  “Hey, what’s up?”

 She didn’t answer, choosing instead to turn her face to the wind.  Even the biting wind was kinder than being this close to someone she couldn’t touch, couldn’t have.

He mimicked her position with a sigh, his shoulder jostling hers as he vied for position close by.  _All the space out here and he chooses to be closest to me.  Figures._ Whatever her head might have said, her body didn’t complain, leaning infinitesimally into him so that it was no longer merely her burden to bear.  For just a second, her secrets were his.

He didn’t complain; his silence made her stronger.

                “You were my best friend.”

                Although she wasn’t looking in his direction, she felt his surprise.

                “Me?” She didn’t answer.  “That seems a little…odd, don’t ya think?”

                She leaned, arm-crossed, over the railing to take in the old view that had surprisingly changed little with time. Ten years from now, it would look roughly the same.  Twisting to glance at him for a moment, she smirked and still said nothing.

                “Not that we’d be friends, because we’re friends already, but friends, _best_ friends is a pretty big deal.”

                _Not in my world_ , she thought but didn’t say aloud.

                “You don’t consider SG-1 your best friends?”

                “Yeah, sure, but I’d never come right out and _say_ that.”

                _Typical Jack._

                “Why?”  She was having fun at his expense, yes, but she was also curious.  This was the Jack O’Neill she’d never gotten to know back then, the one who’d played his cards close to the vest without ever going all-in.  He’d been a different man by the time she’d married him, who he’d been before was someone she was still hoping to learn about.

                “I dunno, I just wouldn’t.” He shrugged, staring down at his booted feet and scuffing them against the concrete.

                She shook her head at him. He was just a big kid, someday he’d be her big kid.  “I know, Jack.”

                He grumbled, “Why’d you ask, then?”

                Smirking, she needled, “Just curious.”

                “Are you this infuriating in the future, too?”

                A quick bump to his shoulder without so much as turning to look at him.  “You love it.”

                The pause that followed was microscopic, could have gone completely unnoticed if he hadn’t exhaled a soft, surrendering sigh.  “Yeah, I do.”

                “Me, too.”

                **…**

~!~

~!~

                Sam watched this new man on the security monitor for over an hour.  She read every tic, every fidget, and every grumble and compared it against the man she knew.  For all intents and purposes, he was that man.

                The others had spent as much time watching her observe him.  She’d never come right out and said what their relationship was, but she didn’t doubt that her confrontation with Kinsey had given her away. She loved Jack O’Neill in the future as she had in the past, and the years had only intensified those feelings. And she couldn’t say a word about it.

                _Sometimes, time travel sucks._

                With a nod to SG-1, she slipped out of the security station and made her way to the interrogation room.  The Jack of the present, rather her past and his present, wandered behind her and she didn’t mind.  In the days she’d been here, his presence had become a comfort.  Breathing came easier, leaving her to wonder if she’d acted too hastily, if maybe she could have survived without him after all.

                At her signal and, she imagined, Colonel O’Neill’s, the guards opened the door and she stepped inside.  She was treated to suspicious inspection by a man she knew too well.  But her heart didn’t reel in anticipation and she didn’t feel lighter than air.  She’d rarely ever felt that way, but she’d thought that now of all times…

                “Who are you,” he asked as though his eyes had told him more lies than he had energy left to believe.

                “Would you believe that isn’t the first time I’ve gotten that question in the last few days?”  She smiled; it felt so foreign.  He didn’t smile at all; that was foreign, too.

                “Who. Are. You?”  He tipped his head as though another angle would reveal the truth. She felt a little pang this time, near her heart, a faint tug in her gut.  What had she changed, what had she ruined?

                “You don’t know me?”

                He stood slowly, his knees popped and he winced unconsciously.  She did the same.

                “I thought I did.”

                Frowning, she allowed herself to drift into the room. She’d always found her way into his orbit without fail; that hadn’t changed.

                “Jack?”  She could say his name again and mean it, mean the man she loved who loved her back, mean her best friend. She could say his name again.  _Thank god._

                “What were you thinking?”  He leaned across the table and she’d never seen him so angry, and definitely not at her.

                “What do you mean?”

                “You risked everything, _everyone_ and for what?” He slapped the table hard enough to shake it, but Sam hardly noticed.  Her own rage – and not relief and not heartbreak, absolutely not – bubbled under the surface despite her attempts to keep cool.

                “For what,” she asked, and thought it was almost funny when he took a step back.  He’d never liked her angry either. “For what, Jack?”  He was close enough to reach for and she wouldn’t dare.  “I did it for you.”

                A muscle in his jaw twitched in time with that vein in his temple.  “You had no right.”

                “I had every right.”

                “None, Sam! None.”  He turned away and began to pace along the narrow side of the cramped room.  He wouldn’t even touch her.  How did this feel like the end of the world?

                “Then, who had the right, Jack?  Who had the right to fix what went wrong in our time, if not me? Please, tell me, and we can make sure it’s them next time. I’ll even send a fruit basket.”

                “This,” he pointed between them, “is everything the frat regs were about. This! What you did was wrong.”  She couldn’t believe – she couldn’t believe he could look at her and say that.

                “Saving your ass was wrong? Saving our ch-” She wanted to be sick. Mikey and Jake floated in her vision, and she almost couldn’t keep to her feet the grief was so strong. “Saving our life together was wrong, Jack?  Really?”

                He stopped moving at the sound of her voice, his back to her and his head down.  He was as broken as she was and she couldn’t see why.

                “You’re alive, that’s what I wanted.  You’re here, that’s what I wanted.  You’re unhappy that I saved your life? Fine, the next time you die, you can stay dead, but don’t think I regret this for a second.”  She didn’t, she couldn’t.

                He turned slowly until they were facing each other.  God, she loved that face.

                “You don’t get to decide acceptable risks for the entire timeline, Sam.  That’s bigger than you and me, that’s bigger than…” He gestured vaguely toward everything that would be and had been theirs together.

                “Even after Charlie, you can say that the universe is bigger than our life together?”  If that was true, then she’d continued a long tradition of loving the wrong men.  His wince was his truth regardless.  Old cracks shimmered in his armor.

                “Don’t make this about me. It should never have been about me.” His fingers reached and stopped for a few seconds, closing around nothing.  He wanted to touch, too, and he just wouldn’t.

                “But it was about you.”  A lot more than she’d imagined her decisions would be when she was younger.  As a captain, then a major, Sam had drawn hard lines about the choices she was willing to make with love in mind.  Love of self had always eclipsed any potential feelings she might have had for someone else, even when that someone had become her CO. A decade hence, she regarded that girl fondly, but considered her a young fool.  She hadn’t loved yet then, not fully.

                “You could have destroyed everything.”

                “Better that way than without you.”  It was selfish as hell, terrifying in view of all the vows she’d taken to safeguard country and planet.  He was her reason and now he was the voice of it.  _I feel like I’m in an alternate reality._   She might as well have been.

                “See, you keep saying that. I don’t know the Sam Carter who thinks that way.”  He strode out of reach to lean against the far wall.  She felt like his prisoner, his enemy; he certainly looked at her as though she was.

                “Then, maybe you don’t know me,” she shrugged stiffly.  This was something she could be okay with, she told herself. So long as he lived and the boys lived somehow, she could deal with his disdain.  She just hadn’t ever believed it would end this way.

                “Maybe I don’t.”  In typical fashion, Jack was never quite content with landing a blow when he could land a knockout.  The air rushed out of her lungs just the same.  She couldn’t say, ‘I miss you,’ because this man, her man wouldn’t care. So, she saved the words for herself and hoped he knew.

                “Fine.”  She turned to leave but paused.  “They’re good people; they’ll take care of you until things are done.”  She could almost see his ears perk up.  He had an eye for the tactical and storehouse of good sense. It wouldn’t take him any time to put together the pieces.

                “What things?”

                She laid her hand on the door, just shy of knocking.  “Things you don’t approve of. I won’t bore you with the details.”

                “Carter.”  No one could have missed that note of warning, least of all her.  The hair stood up on the back of her neck, a little bit anger and a rush of awareness.  She’d never learned that way he had of being far, then damned close.  His fingers splayed possessively across her hip and back. _Damn it_.

                He could burn her through two layers of clothes; he could kiss her without his lips coming within a mile of hers.  This was why frat regs had existed in the first place, because he’d always had the power to get to her and she’d only ever been so strong.

                “Sam.”

                She pressed her forehead to the cool metal door.  She’d reached her threshold with him, she really had.  Losing him had been bad, losing them was worse.  But she was strong enough to walk away, if he’d just let her.

                “Sam, look at me.” She refused.  He brushed her ponytail over her shoulder to stroke the nape of her neck, and the skin immediately began to tingle.

                “You don’t get to do this,” she told him softly, aware of all the ears that had reason to listen in.  “You don’t get to decide when we’re okay and when we’re not.”

                “We’re not okay,” he declared even as he slipped his arms around her.

                “Ya think,” she snapped but surrendered anyway.  Sinking into him was too easy when she’d missed him this desperately.  From how tightly he held on, she knew he’d missed her, too. He just had an idiotic way of showing it.

                She turned into shoulder, letting him enfold her completely. He was an ass, could compete for awards at the sport, but he was hers and he was here.  Her fingers had never heeded her command to let go, so she didn’t let go.

                She never wanted to.

~!~


	17. The Commanders' Table (pre Time Travel AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was the general and she was the new CO of SG-1; they were finally sort of like equals in a way. Maybe that’s why he was telling her all this. [How future Sam and Jack got together in ‘Land of Blue Skies & Clinched Fists’]

                It was one those late nights in the early days of her first command when he first came for her. 

Backdated mission reports had piled up three-deep in her inbox amid the sundry progress reports from the science departments and requisition forms from both Daniel and Teal’c.  She had already arrived at the conclusion that General O’Neill had been right all along: the stuff bred!  If the carbon paper was anything to go by, it did so in a manner terrifyingly similar to her niece’s pet bunny rabbits.

                _White, yellow, and pink_. _What is this, Easter,_ she balked miserably over Daniel’s coffee-stained request to accompany SG-13 to P3X-68-something.  She had already surrendered to the inevitability of ceasing to care about planetary designations.  She was embarrassed over how much trouble she used to give the colonel about them.  When you were responsible for overseeing missions to that many planets, the designations eventually became so much white noise in an already deafening world and who had time for that?  Then-Colonel O’Neill hadn’t and now-Lt. Colonel Carter didn’t either.  She just wanted simple, easy-to-recall names to go with her harmless, easy-to-escape planets.  That couldn’t have been too much to ask.

                _What am I saying? Of course it is._   She gave up trying to read past the blotch of what had to be pure grounds from a rich Colombian dark roast—which smelled so strongly she could taste it—and dropped her head into her hands.  This may have been the last of Daniel’s inane though well-meant requests, but it was not the end of all she had to do.  Teal’c’s requests had been simple, additional conventional Earth weaponry to supplement his staff weapon and time off to spend with Ishta and his son. Easy and approved. Daniel wanted to travel to other planets with other teams and go to Atlantis and go with whoever might have been headed to Atlantis. Daniel had a lot of dreams and Sam was learning a lot of ways to tell him no.

Her scientists were no better.  Her staff seemed to have begun laboring under the assumption that her silver oak leaves had robbed her of the ability to read. The sheer number of unsound and frankly unsafe research proposals they’d handed up for her perusal boggled her already overtaxed mind. 

_These are the greatest thinkers in the world. Oh, god, we may actually be doomed._   It was a sobering and depressing thought that made  her wish for an underground bunker and a lifetime supply of Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia to keep her company.  Unfortunately, she had a bunker—well, a mountain—and no ice cream but an epidemic of paperwork for companionship instead.  She sighed in frustration.  _Guess you can’t win ‘em all._

Sam dropped her hands to pick up the next potential crime against her eyeballs only to find…nothing.  The papers that had been stacked into chaotically organized piles around her had vanished.  Not even the few she’d managed to file into her outbox remained. She’d been here the whole time but hadn’t the slightest idea how this had happened.

In the face of the oddity, her dulled senses sharpened to battle-readiness.  Once they did, it was almost disappointing how fast the mystery was solved.  _No surprise there._

She felt him at her eight o’clock; overheard the minute scraping of his fingertips across the pages as he flipped through them, smelled the faded scent of his aftershave that wafted when he tilted his head at something in confusion, saw the wince he gave at the telling crack of his knee joints with her mind’s eye.  She knew him too well not to have noticed him before, but it had been a long few days and she knew he’d understand. She also knew that he’d know she knew he was there.  It was clearly as confusing as that.

“You should sleep,” he said instead of hello.  The flipping pages didn’t cease and she was nearly sure she heard the quickfire swipe of a pen at least once.  She didn’t turn, couldn’t bother, and put her head back down on the lab desk.  Now that she was a team leader, she had an actual office somewhere, but she was no better at using it than the general had been when it belonged to him.  She was starting to think of it as the Nowhere Place; it didn’t actually exist, everyone just thought it did.

_And I’ve just proved him right, I should sleep._   So, she did, right there in her lab with the base commander standing guard over the door.  It might have been the best fifteen minutes of sleep she’d ever had if she hadn’t had the misfortune of waking up.  But wake up she did, to a patient clearing of the throat and a pair of well-worn, well-shined combat boots rocking directly in her line of sight.  She knew those boots.

Quelling any sense of horror that might have written itself across her face, Sam lifted her head to see her commanding officer smirking inanely in her direction.  She had never wanted to kill someone more for being cheerful.  _He’s clearly out of his mind. They’d never convict._   As if seeing through her efforts at stoicism, his eyebrows quirked up toward to ceiling and the smirking ticked up a notch.  _So dead_ , she decided.

“Have you re-joined the land of the living yet or do you need a minute?”

The words, _“Please, die,”_ warped her tongue all of a millisecond before lucidity and decorum took hold.  “Sorry, sir, I’m up now,” came out instead and she was grateful.

“Glad to hear it. Now, get some sleep.”

Sam felt blood rush to her face and she had no choice but to shrug through it.  “Tried that, sir. Don’t think my CO would approve of me nodding off a second time while he’s talking.”

His crooked grin was nearly answer enough.  “Maybe not, but I bet he’d approve of his second in command entering the field dead on her feet even less.”  He ambled closer and found something fragile to touch on his first try.  She held her breath until he lost interest; it was a long four seconds.  “Like I said, get some sleep. Preferably in a bed.” He halted her objections with a sharp, “Ah! Already got some guest quarters all laid out for you.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets. “They’ve even got these little mints now, right on the pillow.”

He seemed inordinately pleased with himself and Sam had enough experience with this particular animal to recognize when it was time to concede.  She would go gracefully, as if she had a choice.

“Yes, sir.”  It wasn’t like he’d actually given back any of the paperwork he’d stolen.  Her workstation remained bereft of anything more paper-like than a cube of post-it notes.  There was nothing here for her to do and instead of feeling grateful, she just felt lost.  It was nearly funny that she was this exhausted when the last thing she wanted to do was sleep.  _Command comes with its own set of nightmares._   “Are you sure there’s nothing you need me for, sir?”

He appeared to think it over a moment before deciding.  “Positive.  Now, get outta here.”

Swallowing her sigh, Sam rose from her seat and began to shut off her equipment for the night.  It wouldn’t do for anything to blow up in her absence.

“Yes, sir. Good night, General.”

“Night, Sam.”

Her steps faltered just for a moment before she soldiered on.  _He called me Sam._

…


	18. Stardust Children (a slightly alien Jack AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A mission to a foreign world leads Colonel Jack O'Neill into a battle for the minds and souls of that world's children, not to mention his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gen-ish, Jack-centric, made up languages abound but I no longer remember any of the translations--go me!, rated PG, approx 6300 words. I started this almost ten years ago and made one lackluster attempt to rewrite it to my more recent standards before I just let it go.

SG-1 had just stepped from the wormhole onto P97-F568. This world had been first visited by SG-3. SG-3 had been caught in a bit of a misunderstanding landing three of that team's number and ultimately all four in the infirmary. Consequently, SG-1, the SGC’s flagship team, was assigned to that world. Little did their leader, Colonel Jack O'Neill, know that he would be changed forever.

Jack's POV

From the moment I heard that we were taking over his mission for SG-3, I've felt like this was a bad idea. I feel like this is a bad idea as I stand here on this planet, now. Something ain't quite right about this place. And I've never even been here. Maybe it's instincts or maybe it's that thing that mama said I'd get one day.

Starlinnse, I think it was. The absolute silence of stars. The moments of complete oblivion and absolute chaos. Yeah, mama believed a lot of strange things and, oddly enough, she taught me to believe, too.

In those moments only the Knowing few could hold a world together. My mother had been one of the Knowing, a soul reader—or so she always said. In the time of the last Starlinnse, my mother had little help in holding the world together. She couldn’t stop earthquakes or tidal waves or famine.  The only thing that held together was the Earth itself and that was hardly up to her. It was pure chance given the odds.

Every generation there are less of the Knowing and more of the Unknowing, those who can’t read souls. It’s a problem for us, because the next time the planet aches to tear itself apart, there won’t be enough hands aboard to put a stop to it. Hell, I probably won’t even be _on_ the planet at the time.  I’ll fail at the same job my mother excelled at before microwaves were a thing. No good excuse for that, I know.

Charlie had been one of the Knowing, y’know. I'd trained him myself even though my own Knowledge had yet to reveal itself. I taught him everything I ever learned because she wasn’t there to do it for him.  She would have wanted to be, I think.

It’s been years and I still don’t know a thing more than I did back then, but I refuse to believe I am of the Unknowing. My mother told me herself that I had the Knowledge, but that it would not reveal itself for a long while. Maybe, just maybe, it's time for me to know something.

I snap back to reality when Carter taps me and says my name.

"Colonel O'Neill, sir? Are you all right?"

 I nod absently. "Yeah, Carter, I'm all right. How 'bout you? You doing good?"

"Yes, sir. I'm fine."

"You secure the area already?"

"Yes, sir. We're just waiting for you, sir."

I nod again, trying to get my bearings. Thinking about this stuff always throws me out of whack."Which way we headed, Major?"

"Southeast, sir. The MALP and UAV indicated signs of civilization, though it seems that whoever they were, they deserted this place long ago."

"Hmmm. I'm not so sure," I mutter to myself.

"What was that, sir?”

I wave off her question. "Nothing you need to worry about, Sam." Now she's really looking at me funny. I’ve gotta get that whole name thing under control. I’m usually better about it, it’s just this day, this place. Something’s off.

"Oh…kay, sir." I follow Carter's lead. Daniel's behind me, and Teal'c is watching our sixes. I can't shake this feeling of silent panic I keep getting.  And I’m not a guy that does panic lightly.

Our pace is slower than normal. Maybe it's just me, but I think they all feel my apprehension. Teal'c is a little more watchful, Carter is a little more alert, and Daniel is little less Daniel. All in all, we're perfectly in tuned to each other. When one of us feels like there's something wrong, we all feel like there's something wrong.

After over six hours of careful hiking, we approach the ruins the MALP and UAV picked up. From my amateur perspective, the ruins seem fairly new. I'd say an early Earthan Period. I haven't the slightest idea what Earthan means, but that what this seems like to me. Daniel's immediately drawn to the sight, like a moth to a flame. I can just hear him narrating the recording, as he walks in awe of the sight before him. Dead to the world. I sigh manfully. _As always._

"Daniel, what can you tell us about this place?"

"It's from Earth, most definitely, just not from a period I recognize."

I shrug and decide to venture a guess. What can it  hurt?  “Looks Earthan to me.”

"Earthan? I don’t think I'm familiar with that period."

Laying a careful arm across my weapon, I yank my cap off with my other hand to rub my head.  Saying anything is feeling like a bad idea already, like I opened up a nasty can of worms.

"Ah, well, let me see what I can come up with here. I’m pretty sure it was a period during the Dark Ages." Now he's really interested.

"Oh,” he pouts thoughtfully, “and?"

"Curious, aren't we?"

"Jack." Now he's getting exasperated. Better give him what he wants.

"Like I said, I think it was a period during the Dark Ages. As you already know, science was a pretty big taboo at that time." He nods, leaning forward in classic ‘Daniel is listening’ position. "But witchcraft was in a serious upswing. There were more confirmed witches or sorcerers during that time than any other." He seems like he's not sure whether to believe me or not.

"Are you serious, or are you joking?"

I wag my eyebrows, he narrows his eyes.  I can’t resist a chance to screw with him. "I'm very serious. I learned about this period long ago. I just remembered it now." He nods his belief and adjusts his ever-falling glasses.

"Tell me more about this, Earthan Period." And isn’t that a role reversal for you.

I shrug. "Okay. The Earthan Period was a time of great discovery for all would-be witches and sorcerers. They learned that there was great power to be had in the field of witchcraft. They also learned that to have that power they would have to step out of society's limelight. All associated with witchcraft were deeply ridiculed as being crazy or daft. Though they were treated poorly by society, the Wiccan community stuck together and commended, rewarded, and cherished their own, by practically making them royalty. They used what rare history records they had and found the Greek period. they took that and extrapolated various elements of various cultures, before adding their own finishing touches. And voila! You have the Earthans. And their culture." Daniel looks intrigued. He looks ready to ask another question when Carter comes up.

"I have most of my samples, sir. Found anything interesting?"

"Well, Sam, we've found just what you see, basically. Thanks to Jack, I may be able to figure out exactly who these people are and why they left. I was just about to ask Jack something. Jack, did these Earthans have a language or dialect?" I nod.

"Starliss." He looks at me for clarification. Sam looks between us, obviously confused.

"Wait. Daniel, why are you asking the Colonel for information? You're the anthropologist/archeologist. He's just the Colonel."

"Hey!"

"Sorry, sir."

"If it wasn't for Jack, I wouldn't even have a basis to start with. According to Jack, this appears to be of the Earthan Period. I've never heard of this Period, but I was never really all that interested in the Dark Ages, from which that culture seems to have originated. Jack give me an example of this, Starliss. Am I right?" I nod.

"Amone ñatui erge crotuinije." Daniel was analyzing my pronunciation, my tone, hell, the words themselves.

"I have no idea what you said, Jack." I let my lips twitch.

"Amone ñatui erge crotuinije: I knew you wouldn't understand."

"Oh. Let's give it another go." Before we can get around to that, Teal'c runs to us to let us know that we have company. We, including Daniel, fall into formation. Me and Teal'c on the outside and Daniel and Carter on the inside. Daniel is standing with us, because he doesn't even know where to start as far as communicating goes.

"Daniel, go."

"Jack, if you're right, then I don't even know where to start."

"Daniel, just try. You'll think of something." He heaves a deep sigh.

"We are peaceful explorers from Earth. Human explorers." Good going on the Human thing, Dannyboy.

"We mean you no harm." They start talking and Daniel looks most definitely confused.

"Jack, you may be better suited to communicate with them than I am." I sigh now. I nod to him.

"Fall back, Daniel." He doesn't argue. I step forward.

" Who are you?" I need them to talk to see if I can grasp their dialect.

"Tamoné res useslamisckh preamns. < Who are you intruders?>" This is a reasonably easy dialect. The same one I spoke to Daniel just moments ago. I know I should speak to them, but that nagging feeling is back. I'm split with indecision for a moment. I decide to speak.

"Casrwun bnimop sarehje lahmnk tuc Earth. Fjnhit lahmnks. < We are peaceful travelers from Earth. Human Travelers.>" They understand me. Good. I think. That feelings back again. I don't like to ignore my instincts, but my fears can't seem to find a basis for themselves.

I introduce the team. "Hes Doctor Daniel Jackson, shey sen bechlé Major Samantha Carter tuinecl y mi sanlerr, Teal'c reg nuth Teal'c. " They're waiting impatiently for a translation. Daniel especially. He's not used to being on the other side of the language barrier.

" Daniel, they're the Earthans or at least their descendants. There hasn't been a genuine Earthan here in well over seven centuries. They're excited to see us."

" But, sir, none of us are Earthans." I'm almost inclined to agree, until a piece of information reaches the forefront of my mind.

"Maybe, maybe not."

I turn back to the band of people. They're beautiful you could say. They have pale, yet tan skin. It almost seems translucent; opaque-like. Their eyes remind me of my mothers. Dark, clingy, hypnotic. Their hair varies a little. Some have my mother's red hair, some dark raven tresses. One person stands out above, but below the rest. A little girl stands alone off to the side. I turn to her and crouch down.

"Hi." She doesn't understand. " Habesh netru belou. _" I point to myself. She points to me._

_"Dacka." I correct her._

_"Jack."_

_"Dacka."_

_"Jack."_

_"Dick."_

_"Dacka's fine." She grins triumphantly. Oh, she's good. She points to herself._

_"Morhaine."_

_"Morhaine." She nods, happy I got it the first time._

_Morhaine is different. Her skin is like Carter's, pale plainly. Her hair is darkly blonde. She could be Carter's daughter, except for the eyes. Those are plainly Earthan eyes._

_"This is amazing. Daniel their language hasn't changed in the slightest since the Dark Ages. You do know what that means, don't you Daniel?"_

_Daniel feeling a bit back in his element answered, "That there's been little to no foreign cultural interaction between them and any other people since they've been here. " I nod in agreement._

_"Exactly."_

_Morhaine takes my hand. "Havme terln, por favorty. < Come with me, please.>"_

_"Lanitras. < Sure.>" I follow her as if in a trance. She's leading me towards a forest. Trees, more trees._

_The forest floor is silent. There are no sounds. There's a strange light filtering through the treetops. You know that dust you used to watch when you were little. You know the kind that you could only see in a beam of sunlight on really sunny days. Fairy dust is what my mama used to call it. Something magical that touches you in a certain way. That's what's in the beams. I feel it as the tiny dust particles land in my eyes, but it doesn't hurt. I look around to realize that Morhaine is gone, but I'm not concerned. I start to hear laughing, giggling everywhere, then helpless screams. They mingle and converge, becoming one and two sounds all at once. There are little girls and boys much like Morhaine running all around towards and away from me. They're so confused, lost, afraid. They're lonely and sad. They miss their families and each other. They're doomed to an eternity of constant running, their feet never stopping, hearts always beating away the days and nights, tears on porcelain cheeks, hair flying in the wind. Close calls, but no cigars. Always running from themselves and each other. Always praying for a freedom they can't seek. Always hoping to sleep._

_I fall to my knees as their pain fills my heart and head. It's scary and overwhelming. I softly close my eyes and put myself in a pure state of understanding. They need me to give them peace, just peace. Something some spend their whole lives trying to attain only to find that it can only truly be attained at the moment of death. Not for these children. I gasp as the full extent of their misery is presented to me. I feel my knees buckle under the imaginary weight of their souls. I land in the soft, patchy grass. It seems to wrap around me and keep me warm. I hear tiny, accented little voices whispering in my ear. Some talking inanely, others pleading and begging, more asking questions. The voices are soft and careful. There's one though. One that's bigger, stronger, more dangerous. They try to shield me from it, while inwardly praying I'll hear it anyway. I do. It's the loudest, but the lowest. It's what scares the rest._

_" Habeer zemphra y erad us no thera. < _ _Leave here and dare you not return. >" _

_I mentally respond," Juim saleer teram, fajir tyil the children res rea lomhnk. Y reyven peace. Hefa evael reme calla. "_

_I feel this horrifyingly incredible pressure against my chest. My breath doesn't leave, because it can't escape. All I can make sense of now is the treetops above me and the ethereal sunlight filtering through onto me. I can hear them calling me, calling my name. I hear Teal'c. Quiet, strong, stoic Teal'c. Daniel. Articulate, soft-spoken Daniel. Sam. Sweet, intelligent, beautiful, compassionate, caring Sam. I hear them, my team. I reach out to Sam mentally._

_'Help me Sam, please.' She reaches back._

_'Colonel, where are you, sir?' I can't feel anything or even sense the sunlight anymore. I close my eyes and drift softly._

_;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;_

_Six Hours Later_

_Jack's POV_

_I feel tender, urgent hands attempting to shake me from my endless sleep. I'm so lost and scared like the children. Their voices are whispering to me in my ears._

_" Mavla tyi, Dacka. Us tun mavla. Uses inecles res turentulasi fining ta us. Ter res deracs ta us. Us tun mavla. " I feel a sudden smack on the cheek._

_"Mavla, Dacka!_ _< Wake, Jack! >" _

_" Vas amavla! Vas amavla!_ _< I'm awake! I'm awake! >" I sit up, upsetting the grass cradling me warmly. I hear more voices. _

_"Colonel O'Neill, sir. Where are you?"_

_"O'Neill."_

_"Jack, where are you?"_

_I, with the encouragement of the voices in my head pull myself to my feet and just barely keep my balance. I lean up against a tree to catch my breath. I look around, completely disoriented. I began to stumble towards what looks like a break in the tree line. I break through the branches._

_"Jack!" It's Daniel. "Sam, Teal'c! It's Jack!"_

_They help me towards wherever they've made camp. I'm laid down onto my ready sleeping bag._

_"Sir, are you all right?" I nod, wary of my sensitive state._

_"Jack, where did you go and where's that little girl that went with you?"_

_"I went into the woods and Morhaine was gone and I was alone."_

_"What happened out there, sir?"_

_"A lot, Major. A lot. "_

_"Sir, this is going to sound very strange, but I swear to any real god there is that I heard you in my head, thinking to me. "_

_"You did."_

_"I did?" I nod._

_"Yeah." I began to drift again, Sam's face is left my only anchor._

_"Sir? Are you tired? I'll leave so you can sleep." I don't want her to leave me alone with the voices._

_"Sam, please don't leave me alone, again."_

_She looks at me a bit strangely, before responding, "It's okay, sir. I won't leave you."_

_She reaches up brushes my messy hair away from my forehead._

_"You don’t have to worry about ever being alone again, because I will never willingly leave your side, Jack O'Neill."_

_I don't release my anchor, but I loosen my hold on consciousness and let the beckoning darkness engulf me._

_~!~_

_Twelve Hours Later_

_Jack's POV_

_I feel tendrils of consciousness lashing out at me. I don't grasp at them for I fear of what wakefulness shall bring this morning. A gentle hand pushes the hair away from my forehead again. I've felt that gesture many times in my partly restful, partly restless sleep. Carter…Sam. She stayed with me. I stir a bit, but I don't fully awaken._

_"Colonel…Jack, you awake?" I open my eyes to my dark tent._

_"Sam?"_

_"Yeah, I'm here. I haven't gone anywhere. You thirsty? Hungry?" I barely manage a nod. She puts a canteen to my lips and I follow her unspoken instructions. Slow sips."You think you could eat a little bit?" I start to nod, but the memory of those children's misery is still too fresh in my mind to attempt eating. I shake my head._

_"Maybe later, okay?" Her eyes flash with concern, but she accepts my answer with only a parting remark as she exits the tent._

_"You'll have to eat at some point during the journey back to the 'Gate. It's gonna take a lot of what little energy you have just to sit up, much less trek twenty miles back to the Stargate." I wince as I recall the long hike up here. If it was slow going when I thought something was wrong, now that I know something is wrong it's gonna take three times as long to get home._

_I find myself confused, again. "Carter, why exactly are we heading home?"_

_"Well, you're sick and you need Janet and it would make me feel so much better. Please, sir. Go for me, if not for yourself. Please." Damn her for what she does to me and how she makes me feel._

_"All right, Carter. I'll go, but I have to come back." She begins to protest. "There's no one else who can speak the language. No one. I'm needed here, Sam. You know that." She nods and begins to exit again. "I'm doing this for you, Sam. I'd do anything for you." She stops just outside the tent flaps, her face at an angle to this planet's sun._

_I can just make out her lips moving and can just hear her say, "I know you are and I would too…Jack." The moment passes as we remember who we are and our positions in the ChoC (Chain-of-Command)._

_~!~_

_Twenty Minutes Later_

_Jack's POV_

_We've just begun what is to be a twenty mile hike back to the 'Gate. Sam…Carter's finally talked me into eating something after the guilt-trip of a lifetime._

_Flashback_

_"Sir, please eat. If you don't eat, I won't eat and I'll collapse on the ramp and die of heat, starvation, and dehydration because you wouldn't eat with me and I refused to eat alone." Then, she pouted. I sighed, and she knew it was a done deal._

_"Now, sir, eat your MREs. They're good for you."_

_"No, they're not and I don't want 'em."_

_"Eat, them, Colonel."_

_"No, and you can't make me, you big, fat meanie."_

_"You think I'm fat?" Her bottom lip trembled and her big blue eyes glistened._

_"I'm never eating again. I'm fat. You said I was fat. No more eating, because I'm a big, fat cow." Oh, hell, I went and made her anorexic._

_"You're not fat, you're slim and beautiful, and I'll eat, but only if you eat."_

_She looked at me slyly and said, "Okey-dokey. Let's eat." I sighed again. I've been had in the worst way._

_"You just guilt-tripped me in a serious way, didn't you?" Your only answer was the cutest little smile._

_Present_

_That's Carter for you. Execute mission objective by any means necessary. Can't believe Carter would do that? Believe it._

_Carter's in the lead with me being sick and she being next in line. Daniel and I are in the middle, for safety reasons. Because one, Danny's a jinx. Two, I'm possessed with an alien knowledge, again, and three, Danny's a jinx. No one else knows about two yet, but I suspect that Carter is drawing up a theory on the odd situations I'm finding myself in and the incredible solutions I've come up with to get out of them. It's only a matter of time._

_~!~_

_Four Hours Later_

_Jack's POV_

_It's been four and twenty minutes since we began our in my opinion premature journey back to the 'Gate and we've gone exactly four miles and twenty feet. Daniel's always stopping to look at something and I in turn have to explain to him what it is before he unsuccessfully tries to find out himself. With Carter being officially in charge in my currently 'ill' state of mind, Daniel could get away with murder as long as he commits it while she takes her soil and such samples._

_I'm gonna ask Carter, how much farther to the 'Gate? Even though I already know, I feel like asking. Someone else beats me to it._

_"Sam, how much farther until we get to the 'Gate? I need to analyze some of the artifacts I found when we were searching for Jack."_

_"About fifteen miles more, but General Hammond is due to check in about an hour and a half to check out the status of our search for the Colonel. You can have you lab assistants ready any materials you might need for your return." Daniel nods and goes back to studying his 'rocks'. Danny rocks. That was kinda funny. Gotta remember that one._

_~!~;_

_An Hour and A Half Later_

_Jack's POV_

_We stop for a rest and a snack. We can just make out the 'Gate activating just over the gently sloping hills of Hadreidias Ascending. What a name, right? I thought so too, but Earthans were always a bit strange, if you get what I'm saying._

_"Major Carter, this is General Hammond, please respond."_

_"General Hammond this is Major Carter."_

_"Major, good to talk to you."_

_"Likewise, sir."_

_"From the sound of your voice, I take it it's safe to assume that you've found Colonel O'Neill safe and sound and you're bringing him back in one piece?"_

_"Well, sir, I have some concerns about the Colonel's current health." She's looking at wearily, as if expecting me to object. I'm sick, I don't care._

_"I'm sick and I wanna go home. Take me." Carter's looking more concerned than ever._

_"He needs to see Janet, sir. He is not well. At all. He's just admitted that he was sick and said that he wanted to go home."_

_"Bring him home, Major." The General sounds concerned._

_"Aye, aye, sir."_

_"Quit looking at me like I'm gonna suddenly keel over in front of you. I'm fine." *Sudden chill* I feel that voice again. I don't hear it, I just feel it. I shiver all over and shake my head to clear away the lingering voices._

_Sam's looking at me like I'm on my deathbed._

_"I am fine, Sam. Just fine. No need to worry." My head is beginning to throb. I lean up against the nearest tree to regain my bearings. "Carter, Daniel, Teal'c, would you mind if we set up camp here, just for the night or day, or whatever? I'm starting to feel a little um…ill." I close my eyes to rest them, but I don't open them again. If I was still conscious with my eyes open, I'd see the ground and my teammates rushing up to meet me._

_I'm standing in the middle of the forest again and the sounds of the children have begun again, but louder this time. There's a familiar voice out there, somewhere._

_"Mom? Is that you?" Of course that's not mom. Mom's been dead damn near thirty years. Dad too. I shake my head and try to analyze situation. What's to analyze? I'm here, again. How? Why?_

_" Saucbe, Ien taubre us zemphra. < Because, I brought you here.>" That's mom's voice. Even after twenty or more years I'd know it anywhere. _

_"Pavra? "_

_" Se, Dacka? < Yes, Jack?"> I can hear the smile in her voice._

_" Us es tegging a ckic toy tuk this?_

_"Let's talk in English." I nod in agreement._

_"All right. Why am I here?" There's a contemplative silence._

_"Because you're needed. You know that. You told Samantha so."_

_"No, I mean, why am I here, right now?" I know you can get it, mom. Come on._

_"In this vision?"_

_"Yah? Helloooo?"_

_"Don't be a smart ass, Jonathon. I may be dead, but I can still drop you." She's right about that one._

_"What's going on on this planet, mom? I keep seeing things and hearing voices."_

_"It's finally happening for you, sweetheart. You finally know."_

_"Cool. What do I do now?"_

_"You follow those natural instincts of yours. One important thing, you MUST do is: protect Samantha." Protect Carter? Why?_

_"Protect Sam? Why? I'd like to protect her, but she can protect herself. She's said so, I'm sure you've heard."_

_"I have, but she can't protect herself from the things you can protect her from. She, along with the rest of your team and others, will be very instrumental to the future of the Ancient's empire. You already know why." I nod._

_"Yes, mom. I know." She's smiling again. So am I._

_" We are very proud of you, son."_

_"We?"_

_"We. Your father, me, and Charlie." I let out a full grin._

_"You are forgiven by us. Now, you must forgive yourself, for the children. Remember, we're proud and we love you."_

_"I love you too, mom, dad, Charlie." I feel a heavy weight lifted from my shoulders. They forgive me, and I'll forgive myself someday, but it'll take time._

_I can't believe this. I passed out. I swooned like a damned schoolgirl. I'm never gonna live this down. My eyes are still closed. They were. Someone's prying my eyelids open and shining a light into them. I bolt upright and off the stretcher in the 'Gate room._

_"Jeez, Doc. I woulda opened up if you'd just asked first. " Half the room looks scared stiff. "What are you guys looking at?" The Doc steps forward._

_"Colonel, you've been completely unresponsive for the last six hours and suddenly you're responsive, up and jumping. So, forgive us if we're a bit startled to see you up and around." Oops. Six hours. It didn't feel like six hours. Felt more like half an hour, maybe._

_"Are you guys sure it was six hours? It only felt like half and hour, maybe, to me." Of course they're sure, they carried you the rest of the remaining sixteen miles and however many feet._

_"We're sure, Colonel. We carried you back every step of the way. It was no easy task," complains Carter._

_"All right. So you're sure. I can walk the rest of the way to the infirmary. Thank you. " Janet looks surprised that I've agreed to go. Hell yeah, I've agreed to go. I wanna know what's wrong with me._

_~!~_

_Forty-five Minutes Later_

_Jack's POV_

_I just got a complete physical examination. Nothing wrong so far. My eyesight is better than 20/20, my reflexes are lightning fast, and my hearing hasn't gone out yet. Bet I didn't know that one. Do'h._

_" Hey, Doc can I guy get a discharge over here. I'm gonna get grumpy if I don't get my nap (beauty rest)."_

_"Colonel, you're already grumpy." I look to her and mumble._

_"Napoleonic power monger." She's glaring at me something awful. "Sorry. Grumpy." She nods in complete agreement with me. "Is there anything at all wrong with me? Anything that justifies my still being here after more than half an hour?" She answers._

_"There's elevated activity in your temporal lobe that has me a bit concerned. But other than that, you're free to go." Yes! Finally. A shower! Never have I ever been so enthusiastic about bathing._

_I damn near skip to the locker room. It's the mens. Yes. It is totally my week. First, there's a language Daniel can't speak, but I can. Then, I begin to 'know' things. I get to talk to my mother and find that I'm supposed marry Sam and that no one that counts up there is angry at me anymore. I'm feeling pretty damned light._

_Off to the shower I go._

_~!~_

_Thirty Minutes And A Shower Later_

_The Briefing Room_

_Jack's POV_

_I sit down and listen in on Daniel's view of the mission. Boy, does he have a flair for the dramatic. And I'm a doodlin'. Doodlin' little fair haired children, who all look like Sam. They're all cute. Because they all look like Sam. Eva Jessica, Melanie Jaiden, Jacob Thomas, Daniel George, and Carter Delaney. Lots of little Carter babies. 3 girls, 2 boys. Daniel isn't talking anymore. He's reading the names under each picture over my shoulder._

_"Eva Jessica, Melanie Jaiden, Jacob Thomas, Daniel George, and Carter Delaney. 3 girls and 2 boys. You're gonna name one of your kids after me?" I drop my head into my hands._

_"Not if I don't have anymore." Spare me, Daniel. Please._

_"Daniel George O'Neill. Doesn't sound too bad. Now, Carter Delaney O'Neill. Sam's lovin' that one. " Carter's looking very triumphant._

_"Sir, I have no reservations about you naming one of your kids after me. I think that's very cool."_

_"Good, I just hope you'll be saying that when there are two Carter's running around the house." They all freeze and try to understand if I really meant to say what I said._

_'Yeah, I said it and I'm glad I said it.'_

_~!~_

_Two Days Later_

_Jack's POV >_

_"Come on, Doc. Let me go on a mission. I'll be grateful forever. Please, pretty lady, doctor, ma'am?" I pout._

_"I don't wanna do this, but I'm sure you'll find some way to go without my clearing you and that would piss me off, royally. So, I'll clear you."_

_"Yes!" I pump my fist in the air, enthusiastically._

_"This time, Colonel. This time. Now, get out of my infirmary."_

_" Yes, ma'am." I hop off the bed and jog for the door, stopping just outside. I stick my head back in and say, "And, uh, sorry about Napoleonic Power Monger thing. I was out of line and it was uncalled for. You were just doing what you were trained to do, your job. Thanks." She looks surprised at the sentiment._

_"No problem, Colonel. Just try not to get hurt so often or so severely anymore." I give her a look._

_"You don't know how much easier said than done that is. Doesn't matter anyway. SG-1, nor you will have to do this for much longer."_

_"What makes you say that, sir?"_

_"I just have my suspicions that our problems will soon be over. That's all." I wink at her and mosey on out of there._

_I walk down the corridor to the lift and swipe my security card in the keycard slot and wait for the doors to open. Now, where do I want to go? My future wife's lab or Daniel's? Sam it is. I enter the elevator and push for level 18. Hope Carter's not busy._

_I step out of a lift and bound towards Carter's lab. I stop at the door and peer in at the beautiful woman working at the workbench. She has her head tipped down, but I can just hear those gears turning rapidly in her head. Man, I love her. A lot._

_I, using every one of my stealthly abilties, sneak up behind her. I look over her shoulder to see what she's doing. She's isn't actually doing anything. She's sleeping…She was._

_"Unscheduled Gate Activation! Unscheduled Gate Activation!"_

_We both jump and run for the Gate room. Carter gives me looks the whole way. She's wondering what the hell I was doing in her lab while she was asleep._

_"Carter, you snore. Did you know that?" Quit glaring at me like that._

_We skid into the 'Gate room as the General gives the order to open the iris._

_Representatives of Hadreidias Ascending come through the 'Gate. Daniel comes out of the woodworks to greet them. Carter and I come to stand next to him and Hammond._

_There are two women, a man, and a child. In unison they do some sort of position of respect. They cross their left legs behind their right legs; cross their left arms behind their backs; lay the fingertips of their right hands on the center of their foreheads and bowed their heads down._

_I bow my head down, but decline to do the rest of the bow._

_"Wea res zemphra to ees O'Neill. " Everyone looks at Daniel instinctively. He shrugs and looks at me._

_"All I got out of that was O'Neill." Cheeky bastard._

_"They said that they're here to see me."_

_"Tes laugh to ees us, O'Neill. "_

_"Tes laugh to ees usen, too. " They nod. The General steps forward._

_"I'm General George Hammond, commander of this base."_

_" Hes Henaral George Hammond, comandeis tuk this beis." The youngest looking woman came forward. Her dark burgandy hair was swooped up in a high bun with wavy tendrils hanging to her bare neck. She was clad in a white dress with a hood and a conservatively square neckline._

_"Laugh to emet us , Henaral George Hammond, comandeis tuk this beis." She's being cute. I can just tell._

_"Nice to meet you, General George Hammond, commander of this base." This taking a while. "Just llac hime Henaral o Henaral Hammond. " She nods._

_" Ien Delila (Daleela) tuk Avrem, tuk the gih consel._ _Thes res mi associates y ah inecl tuk min._ _This reg Turam, mi trez asissta. " She gestures toward the only man in the group. He's less than average human height, average build. He nods his dark head and retakes his position._

_"I am Delila (Daleela) of Avrem, of the current high council. These are my associates and a friend of mine. This is Turan, my third assistant."_

_"This reg Dala, mi heala y inecl. Shes reg mi mos thruthed."_

_"This is Dala, my healer and friend. She is my most trusted." The shorter, dark-headed women pull her hood back to reveal an olive complexion and dark, gold-flecked eyes. She looked kind of like Janet with contacts. She nods and blinks and smirks a little._

_"Tes laugh to emet us, O'Neill. Thea nunca shuddup bouf us." Oh, I like her._

_"Colonel, what did she say?"_

_"She said it was nice to meet me. And that they never shut up about me." I return my attention to our visitors. " Taverly to Earth. " They look around our gate room silently._

_The child at the obvious apex of the group speaks._

_"Your world outside of these walls is much more beautiful." Someone who speaks our language. Relief!_

_"We'd like to think so, but it's purely a matter of opinion." She smiles, showing a perfect, but disturbed smile. Her eyes dip away from mine for an instant as something startles her. For that brief second I was taken back to my time in the woods. Her strawberry-blonde hair is captive in an intricate braid weaving around her scalp and down her neck and back. At the end of the braid was the end of an orange and pink bow braided into the braid and tied in a bow. She stood mature and tall out of what seemed to be more out of discipline than disposition. Freckles were sprinkled delicately across a straight plain, nose. her cheekbones were pale and high, but still so fragile. Her chin was angular like Carter's, but less sharp. Her eyes are alert and even a little fearful. She doesn't like this. Honey-brown eyes meet chocolate-brown eyes. I try to impose my strength onto her. 'You can do this. You have to. We have to.' She blinks slowly and nods in understanding. She pulls back broad, but bird-like shoulders and holds her head up._

_"We are the Hadreidies , descendants of the Earthans originating from…here I believe. " And of course, now Daniel will speak._

_"We are… well Humans. Welcome to Earth."_

_"Your Colonel O'Neill has already welcomed us. Another welcome would be…redundant and annoying to me personally."_

_Somebody's got a little bit of attitude._

_"But…thank you anyway." Daniel nods at her manners._

_Since, it seems that no one's gonna ask, I will._

_"What's your name?" She turns to me._

_"Rossilyn, but I am often called…Silyn." She's not telling the complete truth. Someone used to call her "Oh, Silly" for the o.ss.i.l.y. in her name, but now no one does, because whoever used to do that is forever running. I nod to her._

_"If we could proceed to the briefing room?" says the General._

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own any characters recognizable as being from Stargate SG-1 & Stargate Atlantis. They are the property of their actors, producers, writers, and studios, not me. No copyright infringement was intended and no money was made in the writing or distribution of this story. It was good, clean fun.


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